Preview 2004-2005: Possibilities
The original 1975 production of The Wiz was a surprise hit. The show experienced a great deal of turmoil on the road-it may be the only show in Broadway history whose costume designer Geoffrey Holder replaced its director-and opened in New York to mixed reviews and no advance sale. A provisionary closing notice was posted on opening night, but Twentieth Century Fox, which had backed the show, agreed to contribute additional funds to keep it afloat.
Word of mouth and a potent TV commercial featuring the breakout song "Ease on Down the Road" did the trick, and The Wiz was soon selling out and bringing a new audience to the theatre. A few months after opening, The Wiz won seven Tonys, including best musical, score, direction, costumes, and choreography George Faison.
The notion of an all-black cast in a retelling of the Oz story featuring contemporary lingo and r&b/gospel/soul/rock songs was producer Ken Harper's. Charlie Smalls wrote his only Broadway score, which features pop-style lyrics that don't always rhyme. The book was by William F. Brown, whose other Broadway work includes the flops A Broadway Musical and The Girl in the Freudian Slip. The show was greatly aided by the performances of Stephanie Mills, Ted Ross, Hinton Battle, Andre De Shields, Mabel King, and Clarice Taylor. In the ensemble as a Munchkin and a field mouse was Phylicia Ayers-Allen, now Phylicia Rashad.
Featuring a heavy dose of camp and tongue-in-cheek, The Wiz was a good idea, executed with style. If some of the writing is ordinary, the music is infectious, and it was a show that simply worked. While its reputation may have been diminished by an unhappy film version starring Diana Ross and, to a lesser extent, a flop 1984 Broadway revival with Mills thirteen performances, The Wiz could very well thrive once more, particularly with Oz embraced in another current Broadway hit. Des McAnuff, who directed the current Dracula, will stage the new Wiz. Robert Brill Cabaret, Assassins is the designer.
In terms of other new musicals, Jerry Springer: The Opera has been put off until 2005-2006. The Rosie O'Donnell-Cyndi Lauper collaboration Find Me appears to be in limbo. Nothing has been heard of late from the Kander-Ebb-McNally musical adaptation of The Visit that was to have had its New York premiere at the Public Theatre earlier this year. And even less appears to be happening with two other Kander and Ebb projects, The Skin of Our Teeth/Over & Over, with a book by Joseph Stein, and Curtains, with a book by the late Peter Stone.
But there is The Opposite of Sex, based on the 1998 film, with music and lyrics by Douglas J. Cohen No Way to Treat a Lady, The Gig and a book by Robert Jess Roth, who is also the director. Kerry Butler, David Burtka, Jeff McCarthy, and Karen Ziemba have leading roles in the show's tryout production, next month at San Francisco's Magic Theatre.
Chita Rivera was, of course, to have starred in the Public's mounting of The Visit. If she's not to have the chance to do that show in New York, there's the possibility of a Broadway mounting in 2005 of A Dancer's Life, an autobiographical evening starring Rivera, scripted by McNally, and staged by Graciela Daniele. This will inevitably be compared with Elaine Stritch at Liberty. And Rivera has never been the sort to be as frank about herself and others as Stritch has always tended to be. But with numbers from many of her musicals, Rivera's show will focus particularly on the various choreographers Michael Kidd, Jerome Robbins, Gower Champion, Bob Fosse, Rob Marshall, Daniele with whom she has worked.
Ever since its 1997 world premiere production at the La Jolla Playhouse, Barry Manilow's Harmony has been announced for a Broadway berth. The show received a good deal of publicity late last year when its pre-Broadway mounting in Philadelphia was shut down during rehearsals. More publicity attended the subsequent announcement that the show's authors had won back the rights from producers seemingly unable to get the show on. With new producers, the show has just been workshopped, so once again, Harmony must be given its annual place in the season preview.
Another project that keeps on getting announced for Broadway is the musical version of Paddy Chayefsky's Marty, with a score by Charles Strouse and Lee Adams and a book by Rupert Holmes. Attached as star is John C. Reilly, who has already appeared in the musical's world premiere at Boston's Huntington Theatre. Mark Brokaw and Rob Ashford are the respective director and choreographer. Strouse hasn't had a new musical on Broadway since Nick and Nora in 1991.
Lately I've been hearing rumblings that The Mambo Kings, based on a novel by Oscar Hijuelos, may be readying itself for the current season. Arne Glimcher, who directed the film version of the story about Cuban brothers in New York in the late '40s, will direct and write book and lyrics for the stage version, with music by Carlos Franzetti.
One project I find particularly tantalizing is the musical version of Death Takes a Holiday, with a score by one of our finest stage composers, Maury Yeston, and a book by the late Peter Stone, who wrote the book for Yeston's Titanic and worked with Yeston on revisions to Grand Hotel.
Death Takes a Holiday is to reunite director David Leveaux and star Antonio Banderas from the revival of Yeston's Nine. This has been mentioned for a possible spring 2005 Broadway mounting. The lack of a living librettist could be a problem; perhaps another writer will become involved if revisions are deemed necessary, or perhaps Yeston himself will do them. Broadway has heard only two complete Yeston scores, and both won Tonys as part of Tony-winning musicals. I hope we get to hear Yeston's new one soon. Needless to say, Banderas's involvement would be of enormous help.
In terms of revivals, A Little Night Music starring Glenn Close and directed by Trevor Nunn is now set for 2005-2006, as may be Liam Neeson in Camelot. At one time announced for the current season was a new version of The Pajama Game, directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall and with a revised book by Peter Ackerman. Given the relatively unenthusiastic reception the piece received when Encores! mounted it two years ago, a new Pajama Game would appear to be a risky venture. One imagines that the show now falls into the same category as Wonderful Town, both first-rate '50s products that, even with strong reviews, are a hard sell to contemporary Broadway audiences.
Other revival titles announced but apparently not ready to happen just yet are West Side Story and Dreamgirls. Not seen on Broadway in almost twenty-five years, West Side Story will, of course, have to return eventually, and Jerry Mitchell has been mentioned as the stager, using, of course, much of the Jerome Robbins original. The new West Side Story is currently being talked up as a fiftieth-anniversary revival.
An announced Bye Bye Birdie seems to have disappeared now that Encores! did the show to less-than-ecstatic reviews for the work itself. In addition to Pacific Overtures, Roundabout has announced a new Threepenny Opera directed by Scott Elliott, but it appears that it's being saved for early 2005-2006.
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