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By Peter Filichia   All right, most of us don’t like the semi-recent phenomenon of “jukebox musicals.” And yet, we must admit that far more often than not such shows spur entertaining original cast albums. Maintaining this tradition is Bullets over Broadway.   Woody Allen’s 1994 film – which insisted that a true artist will […]

By Peter Filichia   So many of us who are crying out for original musicals are doubly grateful for If/Then – because it gives us two of them.   Bookwriter-lyricist Brian Yorkey doesn’t limit himself to a single story when dealing with Elizabeth (Idina Menzel). Just as A Little Night Music has often been called […]

By Peter Filichia   On Friday, May 16, when the Dow Jones average hit 16,491, I interviewed the woman who’d hundreds of times said that the Dow had hit 1,000.   She was lying. But that was Marlyn Mason’s job in How Now, Dow Jones. She was Kate, “The Voice of Dow Jones” who went […]

By Peter Filichia Even a splendid production of Allegro, such as the one that Tom Wojtunik is delivering right now at The Astoria Performing Arts Center, reveals a show that really should be heard and not seen.  Rodgers and Hammerstein’s first failure has a terrific score. Many of us suspected as much in the latter […]

By Peter Filichia Do I hear a waltz? Of course I do. Isn’t Androcles and the Lion by Richard Rodgers? And getting a song in three-quarter time is a given in any of the legendary composer’s scores. Here in this 1967 TV musical, the waltz is the first song, just as it was in Jumbo, […]