Savion Glover
On April 3, Broadway welcomed back its first audience since March 12, 2020, with a 40-minute matinee at the St. James Theatre as part of the NY PopsUp festival, which launched February 20 at the Javits Center and will continue with more spontaneous offerings over the next 10 weeks. This past weekend’s event, directed by Jerry Zaks, featured Tony winners Savion Glover and Nathan Lane, and the socially distanced audience of some 150 primarily consisted of staff members from the Actors Fund and BC/EFA.
Saturday’s show was also used as part of a pilot program to explore effective health protocols in preparation for a fuller Broadway reopening this fall. The 1,700 seat venue had its HVAC system recently updated with MERV13 filters. Other safety protocols included contact tracing, mask enforcement, and staggered entry and exit times. Audience members were also required to show proof of full vaccination, a negative PCR test within the past three days, or a negative rapid antigen test within the past six hours, while the crew and staff had to test negative on the day of the performance.
Glover performed a tap number and a medley of the Broadway showtunes “Memory” and “I Hope I Get It,” which you can watch below, while Lane performed “Playbills,” a new monologue by Paul Rudnick about a theater fan’s connection with Hugh Jackman, Patti LuPone, and Audra McDonald.