BACHARACH’S PROMISES, PROMISES: ONE SINGULAR SENSATION By Peter Filichia
Well, at least he gave us one musical. Neil Hefti didn’t. Billy Joel hasn’t. Ditto Bruce Springsteen. But Burt Bacharach, who worked in the same pop arena as they, did in 1968. He and Hal David, his longtime lyricist, wrote the sensational score for PROMISES, PROMISES. The result was the longest-running musical of the 1968-69 […]
IF GENDER-NEUTRAL TONYS HAD ALWAYS BEEN IN PLACE… By Peter Filichia
Maybe it should have happened years ago, when newspapers made the change. For there was a time when those looking for jobs saw classified ads that said “Help Wanted – Men” and “Help Wanted – Women.” Decades ago, newspapers stopped running gender-segregated ads. The words “Help Wanted” would suffice. What would have happened if the […]
SONDHEIM DESERVED A BETTER FINALE By Peter Filichia
If you’re in a bridge tournament and play a Jack – only to see your opponent put a King on the table – you may hear the trick-taker say, “Don’t send a boy out to do a man’s job.” That, however, is what The New Yorker did when assigning D. T. Max to interview Stephen […]
LET’S HEAR IT FOR THE ORCHESTRATORS By Peter Filichia
This must be unprecedented. Visit the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on West 46th Street, and you may be equally astonished. The signage is up for the upcoming revival of SWEENEY TODD, the show’s third Broadway revival in the last third-of-a-century. Not bad for a musical that deals with corruption, blackmail, serial killing, cannibalism, profiteering and mentally unbalanced […]
FUNNY GIRL: WHAT A RELIEF! By Peter Filichia
In baseball, whenever a pitcher becomes tired and ineffective, a new pitcher known as a reliever succeeds him, in order to prevent further damage. The one who does this most consistently will at the end of the season receive an award called “Reliever of the Year.” We don’t have such a prize on Broadway, but […]
