Diana DeGarmo Joins off-Broadway Production of ‘The Toxic Avenger’

Former American Idol contestant and Season 3 runner-up Diana DeGarmo is back in the limelight, this time tackling the off-Broadway production of The Toxic Avenger, a moody favorite on the theatrical scene. DeGarmo made her debut in The Toxic Avenger on Friday, August 14, taking over the role of the sexy blind librarian Sarah by succeeding Celina Carvajal in the musical. DeGarmo, who’s recently been spotted on Broadway in the hit production of Hairspray, recently spoke of her new onstage role, saying, “I am so excited to be coming back to New York to join the cast of The Toxic Avenger. When I saw the show, I laughed my head off. I can’t wait to start rehearsal - and to be blonde again!”

Diana DeGarmo joins a colorful cast that also features Nick Cordero, Demond Green, Jonathan Root and Nancy Opel in the current off-Broadway production of The Toxic Avenger, which is performing on an open-ended run at New World Stages. Direction for the New York production is led by John Rando, and the rock musical also features a book and lyrics by Joe DiPietro and music by Bon Jovi’s David Bryan.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 24, 2009 - Post a comment

Christmastime Favorite to Tour Several Cities

The seasonal Irving Berlin’s White Christmas comes around just about every holiday season, and this year the Christmastime musical comedy will once again make a cameo on the big stage, albeit with a different strategy than in recent years. Typically, White Christmas plays during the winter months at one or two cities on long holiday runs, but this year the musical is spreading the wealth, selecting seven cities to tour in three months.

Casting for the Walter Bobbie-directed large-cast musical White Christmas has yet to be announced, but the production will likely feature Broadway veterans crooning the Irving Berlin holiday staples “Happy Holiday,” “Count Your Blessings,” “I Love a Piano” and more. White Christmas has been a Christmastime favorite for several years, and the production “tells the story of two showbiz buddies putting on a show in a picturesque Vermont inn, and finding their perfect mates in the bargain.”

The schedule for the ‘09 tour of White Christmas is as follows:

Omaha, NE: Nov. 1-7
Cincinnati, OH: Nov. 10-22
Philadelphia, PA: Nov. 24-Dec. 6
East Lansing, MI: Dec. 8-13
St. Louis, MO: Dec. 15-27
Louisville, KY: Dec. 29-Jan. 3, 2010
Kansas City, MO: Jan. 5-Jan. 10, 2010

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 21, 2009 - Post a comment

National Tour of Rent will Run Through January 2010

Original Rent stars Adam Pascal (”Roger”) and Anthony Rapp (”Mark”) are currently touring the country on the Broadway national tour of the smash hit, and it’s just been announced that the two leading actors will take Rent into 2010, as the national tour of Rent will run through January 31, 2010, when it will come to a close in Madison, Wisconsin. Rent, the edgy rock musical about a group of artists trying to make a living in New York City in the age of AIDS and other troubles, also features Gwen Stewart (”Seasons of Love” soloist), Nicolette Hart (”Maureen”), Justin Johnston (”Angel”), Lexi Lawson (”Mimi”), Michael McElroy (”Tom Collins”), Jacques C. Smith (”Benjamin Coffin III”) and Haneefah Wood (”Joanne”). The rest of the touring schedule for the Rent tour is as follows:

Aug. 7-30: Tokyo, Japan - Akasaka ACT Theatre
Sept. 8-20: Seoul, South Korea - KBS Performing Hall
Oct. 6-18: San Francisco, CA - Curran Theatre
Oct. 20-25: Costa mesa, CA - Orange County Performing Arts Center
Oct. 28-Nov. 1: Cincinnati, OH - Aronoff Center for the Arts
Nov. 3-8: Appleton, WI - Fox Cities Performing Arts Center
Nov. 10-15: Des Moines, IA - Civic Center of Greater Des Moines
Nov. 17-22: Providence, RI - Providence Performing Arts Center
Dec. 1-6: Orlando, FL - Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre
Dec. 8-13: Miami, FL - The Fillmore, Miami Beach
Jan. 19-24, 2010: Toronto, Canada - The Canon Theatre
Jan. 26-31, 2010: Madison, WI - Overture Center

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 20, 2009 - Post a comment

Taylor Swift Talks Broadway

Country music’s curly-haired princess Taylor Swift is one of the brightest stars in the entire music industry right now, and the wide-eyed vocalist has already made the successful crossover from country to pop over the last year. Now that she’s a dominating figure on the music scene, does Swift have plans to get into other industries - namely Broadway? “I grew up in Pennsylvania and the first couple times I went to New York I was auditioning for Broadway and off-Broadway plays,” Swift recently told MTV, “so my first ventures into music and performing were trying out for theater and Broadway, and New York is where you go for that so I used to go to voice lessons every single week in New York City when I was nine and 10 and 11 years old, so New York has been one of my favorite places for a really long time.”

Is this a hint that Taylor Swift wants to make the leap to Broadway anytime soon? Well, with a booming career in the country music industry right now, Swift is still making the rounds across the nation on her Fearless Tour, but anything is possible for this teenage superstar, so be sure to scour Broadway news over the next couple months to see if anything materializes for the glowing Taylor Swift, whose music videos give a taste of her penchant for theatrics.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 19, 2009 - Post a comment

Final Performances Sell Out for Little Mermaid

There are only 16 more Broadway performances of Disney’s The Little Mermaid before it goes off Broadway, and tickets have already been snapped up for all 16 performances of the sold-out affair, a sign that this very popular production will go out with a bang. The Broadway rendition of The Little Mermaid has been hailed “one of the most ravishing shows I have ever seen on a Broadway stage” by TIME magazine’s Richard Zoglin, and the production was the No. 1 selling new Broadway musical of 2008, making its mark on the Broadway realm over the past year.

The current cast of The Little Mermaid includes Chelsea Morgan Stock as Ariel, Faith Prince as Ursula, Drew Seeley as Prince Eric, Norm Lewis as King Triton, Rogelio Douglas Jr. as Sebastian, Eddie Korbich as Scuttle, Jonathan Freeman as Grimsby, Tyler Maynard as Flotsam, Eric LaJuan Summers as Jetsam, Robert Creighton as Chef Louis and Major Curda/Brian D’Addario as Flounder. Timeless songs like “Part of Your World” and “Under the Sea” have made the musical The Little Mermaid one of the highest-grossing productions of the year, and even after the Broadway run at the Lunt-Fontanne, theatergoers can still catch The Little Mermaid on stages across the country soon, as the national tour of the Disney favorite will begin in the fall of 2010.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 18, 2009 - Post a comment

Broadway Star Ruth Ford Dies at 98

Ruth Ford, the iconic starry-eyed stage actress and stunning vocalist who fronted several Broadway productions from the ’40s through the ’70s, passed away last week due to age-related complications at her home in New York City, leaving a legacy of Broadway success in her place. Ford is most famous for her acting in plays such as “No Exit” (1946), “Miss Julie and “The Stronger” (1956), “Dinner at Eight” (1966) and “Poor Murderer” (1976). She also costarred with her husband Zachary Scott in the 1959 Broadway run of William Faulkner’s “Requiem for a Nun,” and Ruth Ford was one of the most important actresses during this era of Broadway.

Ruth Ford began a fruitful stage acting career in 1938, when she joined Orson Welles’ Mercury Theatre and made her Broadway debut in the 1938 Mercury production of “Danton’s Death.” Ford hobnobbed with many famous artists and writers during her day, including Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams and Edward Albee. “They felt very comfortable with her, and she was beautiful, and they loved her,” Ford’s lawyer Karin Gustafson said about the famed Broadway star. “She has an incredible archive of letters, because she knew many people and had many admirers.”

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 17, 2009 - Post a comment

Will Spider-Man Finally Make It to Broadway?

The hotly-debated subject of the $45 million production Spider-Man, Turn off the Dark is at the forefront of the Broadway scene still this week, and though nothing has been worked out concerning the production’s looming budget problems, more has developed on the issue. Alan Cumming and Evan Rachel Wood, the leading actor/actress in the upcoming Spider-Man musical, were rumored to be released from their contracts earlier this week, and even though the producers of the Bono/Edge-aided musical denied these reports, things are most certainly in limbo concerning this very expensive production.

In a statement given by the spokesperson for Spider-Man, Turn off the Dark, the production is still said to be in the works, as “Hello Entertainment is aware of the speculation about the future of Spider-Man on Broadway and is re-confirming that the plan is to resume production shortly and preview on February 25th, 2010 at the Hilton Theatre when cash flow issues have been resolved.” Will Spider-Man finally come together or will the multi-million dollar production and its successive debt prove to be too much to handle for the Julie Taymor-directed show? Stay tuned to find out!

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 14, 2009 - Post a comment

Ragtime Tickets On Sale Saturday!

The return of the Broadway classic Ragtime comes this fall to the Neil Simon Theatre, and tickets to this long-anticipated event go on sale this Saturday, August 15. Ragtime will make its grand return to the big stage starting October 23, 2009, with the opening date marked as November 15. Casting still has yet to be announced, though some actors/actresses from the D.C. run of the show last spring are expected to join the upcoming Broadway run. As of now, it’s been announced that Marcia Milgrom Dodge will direct and choreograph the Broadway set of Ragtime this fall, and more is sure to come regarding roles in the musical.

Ragtime is a musical that strings together the stories of 20th century Jewish, white and African-American families, and the production is based off the 1975 E.L. Doctorow novel of the same name. Ragtime made its Broadway debut on January 18, 1998 at the Ford Center for the Performing Arts, and this Tony Award-winning production is sure to make just as big an impact with the public this year when it comes busting through the double doors at the Neil Simon Theatre in October.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 13, 2009 - Post a comment

Big Acts Invade Broadway in Bryant Park

Attention, New York City dwellers: Broadway is coming to your neighborhood, and we don’t mean in the theater. Bryant Park’s Broadway in Bryant Park series has been a smash success since its kickoff in early July, and tomorrow is the closing date of the 2009 cycle. While cast members from productions like The Little Mermaid, Rock of Ages, Wicked, Shrek, Jersey Boys, Chicago, Burn the Floor and more have all made cameos this summer during Broadway in Bryant Park, tomorrow’s closing performances are sure to steal the show, as cast members from the Broadway productions Billy Elliot, South Pacific, Mamma Mia! and Altar Boyz will be making cameos at The Lawn in Bryant Park, located on Sixth Avenue between West 40th and West 42nd Streets in Manhattan.

The afternoon show will feature each Broadway group performing two to three numbers each, and the August 13 rendition of Broadway in Bryant Park will also feature guest performances by Matthew Morrison (Glee) and John Stamos (Bye Bye Birdie). The lineup of tomorrow’s big show will go on at the Bryant Park Lawn from 12:30-1:30 p.m., and this Broadway sneak peek is sure to be an absolute crowd-pleaser.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 12, 2009 - Post a comment

Top-Grossing Productions for the Week

The top-grossing Broadway productions for the first week in August are now available, and it’s the untold story of Oz called Wicked that has once again taken top honors as the top-grossing Broadway musical to kick off the month of August, earning $1,649,459 in its first week in August at the Gershwin Theatre in New York. The Elton John/Tim Rice-backed Lion King musical grossed $1,493,502 last week at the Minskoff Theatre to take second place for the week on the front of Broadway musicals, with Billy Elliot coming in third with $1,449,415 at the Imperial Theatre. The fourth and fifth place top-grossing Broadway musicals for the first week of August 2009 go to West Side Story and The Little Mermaid, respectively, with the Palace Theatre’s West Side Story garnering $1,315,310 and Lunt-Fontanne Theatre’s Little Mermaid making $1,186,154.

In other news, the top-grossing Broadway play for the first week of August went to Mary Stuart at the Broadhurst Theatre with $408,749, and The 39 Steps at the Helen Hayes Theatre came in second, grossing $278,687. Top-selling Broadway theater CDs for the week went to Jersey Boys, Wicked, 9 to 5: The Musical, Mamma Mia! and Hair, respectively.

To get Broadway tickets, go to StubHub.

Permalink - Posted in General on August 11, 2009 - Post a comment


 Page 7 of 68  « First  ... « 5  6  7  8  9 » ...  Last »