I've taken quite a break from writing here. But now that changes. After last years' foray into the awards season I've done some travelling, a whole lot of work, and a deal of performing myself. I have also begun to lend my voice to theatre reviews at smashcutreviews.com. I do my best to see and write about as much as possible...but being a non-union actor with a survival job at a non-profit theatre company often limits the spending (and time) I can give. My expenses generally shake out in the following priorities: 1.) Rent 2.) Wine 3.) Seamless 4.) Theatre 5.) scraping together what's leftover towards new headshots and/or acting classes...and also seeing movies.
The new Broadway season began with Holler if ya Hear Me...well at least technically. The rap musical failed to make much of a dent on Broadway. But the fall has brought us a slew of shows to take in. It might actually be too many. I don't know about you, but there are just more plays on Broadway than this theatre nerd has time to see. I've done a decent job so far; taking in This Is Our Youth, Love Letters, and The Real Thing. And I have tickets to A Delicate Balance in a few weeks (if you see me at the stage door, just get the eff out of my way. I love Glenn Close more than you do). But I have yet to take in You Can't Take it With You, Disgraced, Curious Incident, or It's Only a Play.
It speaks to the curious development over the past few years, where some of the most worthy straight plays of the season are now debuting in the fall. It used to be that shows in the fall, with only a few exceptions, failed to make much of an impact. They certainly didn't compete for Tonys. But success stories of early bowing productions like Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and The Glass Menagerie have changed the game. Whereas producers used to backload the season with their would-be Tony players in the spring, you can now see definite Tony contenders in October. Though it's hard to keep up with, I'll take this incessant assault of (mostly quite good) straight plays over a barren fall season anyday.
And since most of the current season has been announced at this point, I'm introducing a new feature to the blog: The Contenders pages. On the right side of the site you'll see several links where I have laid out all the currently known contenders for a given category. These will be edited and updated as we learn more about the season, and I will hopefully expand them to include each Tony category very soon. And Mary, before you get up in my face about "But Im oh so sure what's-her-face will be considered featured for this show"; I'm using the best information I have at this given moment to compile the lists. No category placement is technically official til the Tony committee's decision. I'm sure we all know someone "in the know", but I'm just a theatre gay doing the best he can.
Anywhoo, I'm Back! And ready to give you lots of opinions about what's going on with Broadway.
I will leave you with a LEGO recreation of the original staging for Fiddler on the Roof...which I can't stop watching. Danny Burstein: Take a good look at your costume for next season.
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