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      Theater to Stream: ‘Broadway Backwards’ and Starry Readings

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      Among the offerings are a well-matched double bill, Ute Lemper’s tribute to Marlene Dietrich and a virtual revival of Michel Legrand’s musical “Amour.”Theater audiences have become more like movie fans and television bingers: They can settle in for a double bill. Before the pandemic, they might have scheduled a matinee and evening performance back to back, but there were those pesky hours to kill in between. Now it’s possible to simply queue up a couple of streaming shows and hit play.A natural pairing this month combines two engaging autobiographical shows written by gifted actors looking back on their childhoods. Round House Theater of Bethesda, Md., is presenting Colman Domingo’s “A Boy and His Soul,” which played Off Broadway in 2009. Domingo, who portrayed the bandleader Cutler in the film adaptation of “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” looks back at his connection to music and family while growing up gay in the 1970s and ’80s in Philadelphia. This new production is the first major one in which he himself does not appear, with Ro Boddie taking on the role. Through Apr. 18; roundhousetheatre.orgAcross the Potomac River, in Arlington, Va., Signature Theater is presenting “Daniel J. Watts’ The Jam: Only Child.” Under Lileana Blain-Cruz’s direction, Watts (who played Ike Turner in “Tina: The Tina Turner Musical” on Broadway) recalls growing up with his single mother in the 1980s and ’90s. The title refers to fruit spread, but sound and music energize the show, with DJ Duggz spinning onstage and acting as Watts’s occasional sidekick. Through May 7; sigtheatre.org‘Broadway Backwards’Along the lines of MCC Theater’s beloved “Miscast,” in which stars perform songs they would never get to sing in real shows, this Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS annual fund-raising series features gender-reversed performances. This year’s concert mixes new numbers — hold on to your hats during the opener with Stephanie J. Block, Deborah Cox and Lea Salonga — with ones from previous editions, featuring the usual array of starry participants. Through April 3; broadwaycares.org‘Inside the GPO’The GPO of this docudrama title refers to the General Post Office in Dublin, which was central to the 1916 Easter Rising of Irish Republicans against British rule. Created as a centennial commemoration, Fishamble’s production takes place at the actual GPO, which in 1916 had been occupied by the rebels for several days. The company is now streaming a remastered digital version in partnership with various Irish organizations around the world, including the New York Irish Center. April 1-5; newyorkirishcenter.org‘What the ___ Just Happened?’The monologuist Mike Daisey returns to the stage in a new piece livestreamed from the Kraine Theater in New York — in front of an in-person, fully vaccinated audience. The title (you can guess which word was omitted) neatly encapsulates many people’s stunned take on the past year. April 2; frigid.nycClockwise, from top left: Debbie Allen, Heather Alicia Simms, Alicia Stith and Phylicia Rashad in “Angry, Raucous and Shamelessly Gorgeous.”via Spotlight on Plays‘Angry, Raucous and Shamelessly Gorgeous’The Spotlight on Plays series has pulled off a fun feat with its latest reading, the first time the sisters Debbie Allen and Phylicia Rashad have acted together since the PBS movie “The Old Settler” 20 years ago. Rashad plays a grande dame of the stage, and Allen is her friend and director, in this 2019 comedy by Pearl Cleage (“Blues for an Alabama Sky”). April 8-12; broadwaysbestshows.comOne Year of Play-PerViewWhen many theatrical institutions curled up into the equivalent of a fetal position in March 2020, some people got to work. Among them was the enterprising reading series Play-PerView, which is celebrating its one-year anniversary with a mix of new and old works. In the first category is “Babette in Retreat” by Justin Sayre, who in the past year has been cultivating a high-camp sensibility in a steady stream of comedies like “Drowsenberg,” “When Sunny Went Blue” and “The Ducks.” There should be some choice bon mots and slapstick for Becca Blackwell, Nathan Lee Graham (as the title character), Randy Harrison (“Queer as Folk”), Bradford Louryk and Mary Testa. April 10-14; play-perview.comRandy Harrison, left, and Scott Parkinson in “Cockfight Play.”via Studio Theater‘Cockfight Play’Randy Harrison also takes on the lead role of John in Studio Theater’s fully staged digital production of Mike Bartlett’s “Cockfight Play.” (The actual title is just one word, so use your deductive skills). John is in a relationship with M (Scott Parkinson) when he falls in love with W (Kathryn Tkel). “Love?” a startled M says. “She?” Bartlett’s deceivingly simple premise explores the vagaries of romantic attraction, and the director David Muse makes good use of a split screen to overcome the actors’ need to maintain their distance. Through Apr. 18; studiotheatre.orgThe cast of an online revival of Michel Legrand’s musical “Amour,” presented by Art Lab and ShowTown Productions.via Art Lab‘Amour’Michel Legrand’s only Broadway musical was a flop, running for only 48 performances in 2002 — which is a shame because the poetic, surrealistic “Amour,” in which a civil servant realizes he can walk through walls, has plenty of the gorgeous melodies you’d expect from the French composer. Now, Art Lab and ShowTown Productions are presenting a revival starring Derrick Baskin (a Tony Award nominee for “Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations”), Drew Gehling (“Waitress”), Kara Lindsay, Adam Pascal, Christiani Pitts and Rachel York. It is high time “Amour” gets some love. April 2-4; stellartickets.com‘Period Piece’Don’t expect costumes of yesteryear. This project, conceived by Susan Cinoman, has enrolled an impressive roster of playwrights — among them, Ngozi Anyanwu, Bekah Brunstetter, Lisa D’Amour, Kirsten Greenidge, Lauren Gunderson, Theresa Rebeck, Sarah Ruhl and Caridad Svich — to create monologues about periods. The works, directed by Karen Carpenter (“Love, Loss, and What I Wore”), are spread over three evenings, and each has a unique cast; participants include Geneva Carr, Judy Gold, Julie Halston, Jessica Hecht, Mia Katigbak, Beth Leavel, Lauren Patten and Julie White. April 12, 19 and 26; periodpieceplay.com‘Hype Man: a break beat play’This play with music by Idris Goodwin revolves around the relationship between a white M.C. (Michael Knowlton) and his Black hype man (Kadahj Bennett). Their friendship goes from complicated to adversarial as they react differently to a case of police brutality, while their beatmaker (Rachel Cognata) is stuck in the middle. The show ran in New York in 2018, but Company One’s version, presented by the American Repertory Theater, is freshly urgent, considering the past year’s debates around policing and the appropriation of historically Black art forms. April 8-May 8; americanrepertorytheater.orgUte Lemper in “Rendezvous With Marlene.”Russ Rowland‘Ute Lemper: Rendezvous With Marlene’One night in 1988, Marlene, as in Marlene Dietrich, phoned her fellow German chanteuse Ute Lemper, then starring in a production of “Cabaret” in Paris. The two women chatted for hours. Three decades later, Lemper wrote and starred in a cabaret tribute that dives into Dietrich’s life and songs. The York Theater, which hosted the show in 2019, is presenting a virtual version that was filmed at the beloved East Village boîte Club Cumming. April 8-10; yorktheatre.org More

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      Casting a ‘Follies’ of the Future, With Beyoncé and Ben Platt

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      In the 50 years since the musical’s debut, revivals and concerts have served its great songs to great stars. Who’d be our Broadway babies 25 years from now?“Follies” is every musical theater nerd’s favorite casting puzzle. It needs names that evoke nostalgia for the showbiz past but also skilled triple-threats who match the characters — and one another. Below, a look at performers who originated the six major roles, and a selection of those who followed over the last 50 years. Plus: Our dream cast for the 2046 revival, when “Follies” will be 75 and the nostalgia will be for today.Benjamin StoneDistinguished. Wealthy. Unfaithful. Depressed.From left: John McMartin, Victor Garber and Benjamin Walker.From left: Associated Press, Sara Krulwich/The New York Times and Richard Perry/The New York TimesOf all the original stars of “Follies,” only John McMartin came without nostalgic baggage. He was a theater actor first — and that’s how Ben, a philanthropist and retired politician, has been cast ever since.For the 2007 Encores! production, the four-time Tony nominee Victor Garber was Ben to Donna Murphy’s Phyllis. The pair looked perfect together, like a president and first lady.For the 75th anniversary revival, Benjamin Walker, who has played Andrew Jackson onstage and Abraham Lincoln (vampire killer) on film, seems just right.Buddy PlummerManic. Sweaty. Unfaithful. Depressed.From left: Gene Nelson, Mandy Patinkin and Ben Platt.Associated Press, Sara Krulwich/The New York Times, Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesA former Hollywood hoofer — he played Will Parker in the movie of “Oklahoma!” — Gene Nelson was dead-on casting for the salesman unfortunate enough to be in love with his wife.When the New York Philharmonic produced a concert version for a gala in 1985, Mandy Patinkin took the role — and shook it for all it was worth.Sure, he’s already got his mitts on the “Merrily We Roll Along” movie, but wasn’t “Dear Evan Hansen” a de facto audition for Ben Platt to play this walking nervous breakdown, too?Phyllis Rogers StoneElegant. Icy. Unfaithful. Angry.From left: Alexis Smith, Diana Rigg and Beyoncé.From left: Associated Press, Andrea Mohin/The New York Times and Kevin Winter, via Getty Images for The Recording AcademyBy 1971, Alexis Smith was long retired from Hollywood, where her aloof, glamorous aura made her a star of the 1940s. That persona (and timeline) made her perfect for Phyllis.Who better than Diana Rigg, that former Avenger, to take the role of a brilliantly imperious wife for the 1987 London premiere?Lucy is juicy. Jessie is dressy. Or so Phyllis sings, describing her two contrasting halves. Beyoncé is all that, and more. Case closed.Sally Durant PlummerFrilly. Romantic. Faithful. Nuts.From left: Dorothy Collins, Bernadette Peters and Ruthie Ann Miles.From left: Associated Press, Sara Krulwich/The New York Times and Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesIn the 1950s, Dorothy Collins was a lovely B-list songbird on “Your Hit Parade.” In 1971, she still had the voice — and despite a big smile, the acting chops to make Sally dark.Bernadette Peters took the role in the 2011 Broadway revival, stripping away Sally’s social skin and turning darkness into madness.Ruthie Ann Miles won a Tony Award for her impassioned rendition of “Something Wonderful” in “The King and I.” Sally’s “Losing My Mind” is another ode to longing worthy of her heart-melting voice.Hattie WalkerIndomitable. Leather-Lunged. Ancient. Ageless.From left: Ethel Shutta, Elaine Stritch and Bernadette Peters.From left: Martha Swope, via The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Sara Krulwich/The New York Times and Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThe former radio star Ethel Shutta was 74 when she originated the role — and debuted its great song “Broadway Baby”; her own Broadway debut was in 1922.For the 1985 concert, no one was going to get between Hattie and Elaine Stritch, who sang “Broadway Baby” for most of the next 30 years.In 2046, Bernadette Peters will be 98 — and look 48. Having already played Sally in the 2011 revival, she’ll be perfect for a role she has never played except in real life.Carlotta CampionBruised. Tough. Hilarious. Still Here.From left: Yvonne De Carlo, Carol Burnett and Justin Vivian Bond.From left: Associated Press, Sara Krulwich/The New York Times, Deidre Schoo for The New York TimesYvonne De Carlo, the best known member of the original cast, portrayed the former B-list star who sings “I’m Still Here.”For the same 1985 concert, Carol Burnett — a bigger star than any of the “Follies” characters — was a curveball Carlotta. But no one could sell the setup for her big number better: “It was supposed to be a sad song, but it kept getting laughs.”How much Carlotta was there in Kiki DuRayne of “Kiki & Herb” fame? More than a splash. In 2046 it’ll be time for her creator, the cabaret chanteuse Justin Vivian Bond, to drink up, close the bar — and bring down the house. More

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      ‘Follies’ Was My First Broadway Show. 50 Years Later, I Remember It All.

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      On a thrilling trip to New York, a 16-year-old budding critic learned that the insistent optimism of musical theater was a beautiful lie.At long last, I was exactly where I had yearned to be for most of my young life. I had arrived in the holy land, which for me was a show palace in New York City, the world capital of my childhood fantasies. My very first Broadway musical, a form of entertainment I regarded as a religion, was about to begin.Then the lights went down in the cavernous Winter Garden Theater. It got dark, which I had expected. It stayed dark, which I hadn’t. The stage was flooded in shadow, and you had to squint to make out the people on it. Some were tall, spectral beauties from another era in glittering headdresses, and others were as ordinary as my parents, dressed up for a night out. None of them looked happy.The grand orchestral music seemed to be eroding as I listened, like some magnificent sand castle dissolving in the tide, as sweet notes slid into sourness. This was definitely not “Hello, Dolly!” or “Bye Bye Birdie” or “Funny Girl,” whose sunny, exclamation-pointed melodies I knew by heart from the original cast recordings.I didn’t know what had hit me. I certainly didn’t know that it would keep hitting me, in sharp and unexpected fragments of recollection, for the next 50 years.It was the spring of 1971. The show was“Follies,” a title that turned out to refer to both bygone Ziegfeld-style spectacles and the delusions of its main characters. It had a score by a rising composer named Stephen Sondheim and was directed by Harold Prince and Michael Bennett, names that didn’t mean much to me then. The cast included Yvonne De Carlo, Gene Nelson and the divine Alexis Smith, whom I knew from old movies on television.A ghostly showgirl in the original production of “Follies.”Martha Swope, Billy Rose Theatre Division/The New York Public LibrarySince the show was still in previews, there had been no reviews to cue my expectations. And word of mouth hadn’t reached Winston-Salem, N.C., where I was a 16-year-old public high school student.My parents had finally succumbed to my pleas to be taken to Manhattan, where my older sister lived. We were all side-by-side in orchestra seats, and I could feel my mom and dad basking in my excitement.That excitement was tinged with a thrill of illicit betrayal. Yes, “Follies” was undeniably a big Broadway musical, staged with an opulence that would be unthinkable today. But this tale of two unhappy couples, stalked by the ghosts of their younger selves during a showbiz reunion in the ruins of a once stately theater, was telling me that the optimistic promises of the musical comedies I had been weaned on were lies.In a cover story that came out a month later — its pictures would adorn my bedroom walls, along with posters of Humphrey Bogart and Vanessa Redgrave, until I left for college — Time magazine enthusiastically (and accurately) described “Follies” as anti-nostalgic, a modern corrective to the cheery, escapist camp of hit revivals like “No, No Nanette.”Time’s assessment was the opposite of that of the New York Times critics Clive Barnes and Walter Kerr, who didn’t like “Follies” at all. The plot, they wrote, was hackneyed and formulaic. As for the songs, with their homages to styles of showbiz past, Barnes called them a “non-hit parade of pastiche.”I couldn’t disagree about James Goldman’s book, which felt like a rehash of the best sellers about middle-aged disenchantment I borrowed from my parents. (I already suspected that my future was in criticism.) But the songs stuck with me, along with piercing images of aging performers clinging to a waning spotlight. And I had a vague sense that I would be destined to forever recall this odd and majestic show “like a movie in my head that plays and plays,” to borrow from its script.In some ways, “Follies” was a perfect match to my adolescent self. My parents had always encouraged me to understand that old people hadn’t always been old, to look for the layers of what they had been. (I was fascinated by the culture of my grandparents’ generation, which meant that references to Brenda Frazier and “Abie’s Irish Rose” didn’t go over my head.)And part of what I found so affecting about musicals were the differences between their exalted forms and the often ordinary lives they portrayed. (I would restage classic musicals in my head with my friends and family in the leading roles; it made me cry happily.)What I didn’t get then — and couldn’t have as a teenager — was how the music was the very sound of memory. It was the cleverness of Sondheim’s lyrics that attracted me in my youth. I loved quoting their sophisticated rhymes.But the older I got, and the more I listened, the more I appreciated the complexity of the pastiche songs, like “The Story of Lucy and Jessie,” “Broadway Baby” and the torchy “Losing My Mind” (which I confess to having sung, drunk, in a piano bar). These aren’t just facile imitations from another era; they’re inflected with the echoes and distortions of all the years that have passed since. As a memory musical, I came to realize, “Follies” approaches Proustian dimensions.When I hear anything from “Follies” now — or see a new production (I’ve written about seven incarnations for The New York Times) — it’s with the memory of watching that first cast of characters remembering. Every time what I’m listening to sounds deeper and richer, and sadder and funnier. And I recall, with a tightening of my chest, that 16-year-old boy staring at the stage in rapture and bewilderment. More

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      Freddie Redd, Jazz Pianist and Composer, Is Dead at 92

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      He was best known for writing the music for “The Connection,” an Off Broadway play that depicted the lives of heroin-addicted musicians in New York.The pianist Freddie Redd in a scene from the 1961 movie “The Connection.” He composed the music for the play it was based on, which was also used in the film, in addition to appearing in both.Alamy Stock PhotoFreddie Redd, a pianist and composer who released a pair of well-received albums for Blue Note Records in the early 1960s, then spent more than half a century bouncing through different cities as an ambassador of jazz’s golden age, died on March 17 at a care facility in Manhattan. He was 92.His grandson Leslie Clarke said he had died in his sleep, but did not give a cause.Mr. Redd is best known for writing the music for “The Connection” (1959), an Off Broadway play by Jack Gelber that depicted the lives of heroin-addicted musicians in New York, and that two years later became a renowned film directed by Shirley Clarke. Mr. Redd appeared in both.Largely self-taught, Mr. Redd was particularly known for his compositions and for his skill as an accompanist. Even when he was the one soloing, his left hand’s roving chords were often as rich as his right hand’s improvised lines.“The Music From ‘The Connection,’” released in 1960, was Mr. Redd’s first album for Blue Note; it was followed in 1961 by the similarly acclaimed “Shades of Redd,” which featured an all-star band: the alto saxophonist Jackie McLean (who was also in “The Connection”), the tenor saxophonist Tina Brooks, the bassist Paul Chambers and the drummer Louis Hayes.He recorded another album’s worth of material in 1961, but those tapes were shelved after Mr. Redd had a falling-out with one of Blue Note’s founders, Alfred Lion. It was finally released as “Redd’s Blues” in 1988. His studio career slowed down, and by the mid-1960s he had moved to Europe, where for audiences his presence became symbolic of a vanishing halcyon age in small-group jazz.A native New Yorker, Mr. Redd did the inverse of the pilgrimage made by most major jazz musicians: He started his career at the center of the jazz universe, then moved out. And moved, and moved again.From the mid-’60s on, he would spend stretches in Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Paris, London, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Guadalajara, Baltimore and Carrboro, N.C. In his 80s he returned to New York, where he recorded two albums for the SteepleChase label and spent his final years.Mr. Redd told The New York Times that his peripatetic career had provided him creative satisfaction,  if not always fair pay.“I like to move around,” he said in a 1991 interview. “It’s always refreshing because you don’t know the nuances, the tricks of the new place. Unfortunately, the price I’ve paid for being a maverick is living a lifestyle that hasn’t been particularly supportive. But I don’t have regrets. There’s a lot out there to find out about, and sometimes you can’t do it in a week or a month.”Mr. Redd in performance at Smalls Jazz Club in Manhattan in 2011.Jack Vartoogian/Getty Images/Getty ImagesFreddie Redd Jr. was born in Harlem on May 29, 1928, to Freddie and Helen (Snipes) Redd. His father was a porter who played the piano at home, and his mother was a homemaker. His father died when Freddie was 2, but he left behind the instrument on which Freddie would teach himself to play.In addition to his grandson Mr. Clarke, Mr. Redd is survived by a stepdaughter, Susan Redd; two other grandchildren; and two step-grandchildren. His wife, Valarie (Lyons) Redd, died before him, as did his children, Stephanie Redd and Freddie Redd III.Mr. Redd was drafted into the Army in 1946. He later remembered first hearing bebop while stationed in South Korea, on a record played by a fellow service member. He was hooked.After returning to New York in 1949, he started playing with leaders on the scene like Art Blakey, Gene Ammons, Sonny Rollins and Art Farmer; he recorded his first album, “Freddie Redd Trio,” for Prestige in 1955 and spent time in California performing with Charles Mingus.“During that period, we realized that we were a brotherhood; we were all after the same thing,” Mr. Redd told The Times, remembering his colleagues on the modern jazz scene in the 1950s. “We were drawn to the inspirational aspect of the music. It was a wonderful time.”After being arrested for marijuana possession, he lost his cabaret card, a document issued by law enforcement that was required of anyone performing in nightclubs. Unable to work in clubs, he moved into a loft in Greenwich Village and became part of a scene that included visual artists, poets and other musicians.There Mr. Redd met the actor Garry Goodrow, who had just been cast in “The Connection,” a new play at the Living Theater that put the lives of heroin-addicted musicians on intimate display. That led to an introduction to Mr. Gelber, who hired him to compose the music and perform as a member of the cast.“The Music From ‘The Connection’” was the first of three albums Mr. Redd recorded for Blue Note in the 1960s, although the third was not released until 1988.Blue NoteThough the film version of “The Connection” is now recognized as a classic of indie cinema, its raw and unflinching portrayal came into the cross hairs of censors in the United States, where it was hardly ever screened.A few years later, in one of his few pop studio dates, Mr. Redd was the organist on James Taylor’s debut single, “Carolina in My Mind.”In the liner notes to a Mosaic Records boxed set, “The Complete Blue Note Recordings of Freddie Redd” (1989), Jackie McLean reflected on Mr. Redd’s chimerical career. “You never know what town you’ll see” the pianist in, he wrote. “He’s always been itinerant. Freddie just appears from time to time, like some wonderful spirit.” More

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      ‘Game of Thrones’ Aims for Broadway

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      A stage adaptation is in the works for Broadway, the West End and Australia. The goal is a 2023 debut.“Game of Thrones” ended in 2019 but George R.R. Martin still hasn’t finished the next novel in his Song of Ice and Fire series, the books that inspired the globally popular HBO drama.Alas, no word on when that might happen. But impatient fans may have something else to look forward to: The return of favorite characters like Ned Stark and Jaime Lannister in a stage adaptation of “Game of Thrones” that is being developed in the hope of productions on Broadway, in London’s West End and in Australia, with a target debut of 2023.“It ought to be spectacular,” Martin said in a statement announcing the play on Tuesday.The author will write the story alongside the playwright Duncan Macmillan, who also adapted George Orwell’s “1984” for the stage and recently wrote “Lungs,” a play that streamed live from London’s Old Vic Theater last summer. Dominic Cooke, a former artistic director of the Royal Court Theater, will direct.Martin said the play, which is not yet titled, will be set during a pivotal moment in the history of the series — The Great Tourney at Harrenhal, which took place 16 years before the events of “Game of Thrones” — and include many of the show’s “most iconic and well-known characters.” The production’s story, he said, will be “centered around love, vengeance, madness and the dangers of dealing in prophecy, in the process revealing secrets and lies that have only been hinted at until now.”The Great Tourney featured jousting and archery competitions and was considered the biggest tournament in Westeros history. No specific characters have yet been confirmed to recur, but a few seem like safe bets — a young Ned Stark, his sister Lyanna, and a braggadocious teenage Jaime Lannister all attended the event in Martin’s books.Simon Painter, Tim Lawson and Jonathan Sanford will produce, in partnership with Kilburn Live. Painter is known for creating large-scale touring shows like “The Illusionist” franchise, which he launched with Lawson. Vince Gerardis will also serve as an executive producer.The play is the latest in a series of prequel projects that have been announced since the HBO fantasy epic concluded in 2019. Martin recently agreed to a five-year deal with HBO to create content for the network, and one “Game of Thrones” prequel, “House of the Dragon,” has already been greenlit, with an expected premiere in 2022.The series became a singularly enormous hit for HBO, regularly attracting millions of viewers for each episode across its eight seasons. The final episode was the most-watched of the series, drawing 19.3 million viewers when it aired in May 2019.This will not be the first “Game of Thrones” project for the stage. Ramin Djawadi, the show’s composer, toured with musicians playing the score set to clips from the series in arenas all over the world from 2017 to 2019, complete with confetti snow, sparks, smoke and “dragon” fire.Other fantasy epics have attempted journeys to the stage after the conclusion of their literary sagas, among them J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series and J.R.R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” books. The two-part “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” which debuted in London in 2016, won six Tony Awards during its Broadway run, which began in 2018, and has been produced in Melbourne and Toronto. But the “Lord of the Rings” musical, which opened in Toronto in 2006 before transferring to the West End, was never a critical — or box office — success, and went on to become one of the biggest commercial flops in West End history.But, right now, for Westeros fans, excitement is running high.“The seeds of war are often planted in times of peace,” Martin said. “And now, at last, we can tell the whole story … on the stage.” More

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      ‘Listening Party’ Review: Can Songs Heal a Brotherly Divide?

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      In “The Jackson C. Frank Listening Party w/ Special Guests,” the musician is simultaneously central and peripheral to the story.The title character of “The Jackson C. Frank Listening Party w/ Special Guests,” from the New Light Theater Project, is a musical footnote: A troubled artist, Frank recorded his only album when he was 22, in 1965, which Paul Simon produced. Frank died at 56 after a life marked by tragic accidents, mental illness and a stint of homelessness.I’d never heard of him — not realizing he had written the achingly beautiful “Blues Run the Game,” which has been covered by Sandy Denny, John Mayer and Counting Crows, among many others — and initially thought the playwright Michael Aguirre had made Frank up as a kind of theatrical answer to the fictional folk singer of the film “Inside Llewyn Davis.”But yes, Frank and his music are real, and we get to know a little more about them in this new streaming production, presented by 59E59 Theaters.“Listening Party” is not, however, a traditional bio-play, and Aguirre does not get into the weeds of Frank’s life and artistry. The musician is simultaneously central and peripheral in a show — which essentially takes place in the present day — that is more interested in how music can foster personal connections and, perhaps, a sense of community.For Allen (Aguirre), listening to albums was something he and his older brother, Rob (Sean Phillips), had ritualized growing up: They would buy a new CD every Friday, go home and play to the whole thing in order. Aguirre was largely inspired by his own childhood, as Allen recounts those days and how they helped him bond with Rob. Now he attempts to do the same with the audience as we all listen to Frank’s self-titled album at the same time.The show includes links to the music on various platforms, including Spotify and YouTube, and at regular intervals, Allen instructs us to press “play” on a specific song. We listen while watching him listen, and then it’s back to Allen’s reminiscences about growing up in Rob’s shadow. By the end, we’ve mainly learned that Allen is the white-bread straight man to Rob’s enigmatic free spirit, which is not all that much by way of insights.Bethany Geraghty plays the mother of Aguirre’s character, Allen.via New Light Theater ProjectAt one point, Allen mentions how Kanye West invited a select few to Wyoming in 2018 to bask in the glory of his album “Ye.” But that type of event was more promotional launch than listening party, creating a highly controlled environment in which information flowed only one way — as it does in this play, since Aguirre and the director Sarah Norris are at the helm, and we’re following their cues.Allen sketches out Frank’s life, with the special guests of the title — Paul Simon (William Phelps), the old hippie Grandma Woodstock (Dana Martin) and the brothers’ mother (Bethany Geraghty) — not adding anything of great import, especially since the portrayals are rather cartoonish. Aguirre is more interested in the old-fashioned concept of sharing music in a more organic, possibly gentler way than posting a playlist online.Allen likes to think those CDs sustained their brotherly complicity, so when Rob goes missing, Allen deals with it by reflecting on their old listening habits and perhaps, indirectly, on our current ones — when was the last time you sat down with an album in its entirety and in sequence?But did Allen and Rob know each other well? It looks increasingly as if they did not, at all, so Allen’s fixation on their listening parties feels like an exercise in solipsistic nostalgia — an issue Aguirre skirts, maybe because it would imply that sharing art does not shed any special light onto someone else.The Jackson C. Frank Listening Party w/ Special GuestsThrough April 11; newlighttheaterproject.com More

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      in Television

      ‘Diana’ Musical Sets Netflix Run — and Broadway Opening Night

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      In an unprecedented move, a recording of the show will start streaming in October, while audiences can see it live (if theaters reopen) in December.“Diana,” a new musical about the idolized but ill-fated British princess, managed to get through nine preview performances before Broadway shut down last March.Now, one year, one pandemic, and one Oprah interview later, the show is ready to try again, with a new strategy and a new context.In a first for a Broadway show, a filmed version of the stage production will start streaming before the musical opens. “Diana,” which was shot over a week last September in an audience-less Longacre Theater, will begin streaming on Netflix on Oct. 1, and then two months later, on Dec. 1, will resume previews on Broadway.The musical’s producers announced Tuesday that they intend to open Dec. 16, which is 625 days after its originally scheduled, but pandemic-postponed, opening night. The producers are putting their Broadway tickets on sale now, and counting on the Netflix film, which will have an open-ended run, to boost interest in the stage production.“I think people will see the movie and will say, that’s a show I want to see in person,” said Frank Marshall, a prominent filmmaker who is one of the musical’s lead producers. Another lead producer, the Broadway veteran Beth Williams, acknowledged that the plan involves “a slightly more complicated rollout,” but added “we feel like it’s an incredible opportunity to put ‘Diana’ in front of the global Netflix audience, and then give them an opportunity to see it live.”Broadway, of course, remains closed in an effort to contain the spread of the coronavirus, and producers expect that most full-scale plays and musicals won’t attempt to start performances until after Labor Day. “Diana,” which chronicles the life and death of the Princess of Wales, who was the first wife of Prince Charles, is among the first shows to put tickets on sale and to choose a specific date for a target opening.The scheduling, Marshall said, was a matter of trying to anticipate how the country’s post-pandemic reopening will unfold, and trying to coordinate the two projects to strengthen them both. “We wanted to make sure our marketing plans aligned,” he said. “I’m very optimistic about the fall, for both movies and for Broadway.” (A spokesman for the show declined to say how much Netflix paid for the streaming rights.)The musical, featuring Jeanna de Waal in the title role, is directed by Christopher Ashley and choreographed by Kelly Devine, who previously collaborated on “Come From Away”; it was written by Joe DiPietro and David Bryan (the Bon Jovi keyboardist), who created the Tony Award-winning “Memphis.”Through virtual and in-person work, the show, which had a pre-Broadway production at La Jolla Playhouse, was revised early in the pandemic. The producers said they do not expect further revisions, and expect their cast to remain intact.Diana has remained an object of public fascination in the years since her death in a 1997 car crash. But her story also has a contemporary sequel, as her younger son, Harry, and his wife, Meghan, stepped away from their royal duties, and, in an interview this month with Oprah Winfrey, he said that “my biggest concern was history repeating itself.”The lives of Diana’s children are not the subject of the new show. “You see Diana become a mother, but her children are not in the musical,” Williams said. “We’re telling the story of a complicated marriage, and at the same time we’re telling a coming-of-age story, and we’ve always seen it as a celebration of Princess Diana, whose legacy will live forever.”The producers said they don’t yet know what sort of safety protocols might be required for cast, crew, or ticket holders at the in-person production. Will there even be an opening night party? “There will be a celebration,” Williams said. “It’s too soon to know what that will look like.” More

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      Review: In ‘Crowns, Kinks and Curls,’ Getting to the Roots of Black Hair

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      Keli Goff’s series of vignettes feature Black women recounting how their hair affected their school lives, relationships or careers.I have 4b hair that remained virgin hair, mostly styled in box braids and cornrows with extensions, until I was 13, when I got my first relaxer. My scalp has known chemical burns, hot comb burns, curling iron burns, flat iron burns and the unrelenting throbbing that comes with hours of tight root-wrenching braiding. I got my big chop at 21 and have been natural — years of T.W.A.s and twist-outs and wash ‘n’ go’s — ever since.Do you get what I’m saying, or am I speaking another language?I’ve written about my hair before, and every time I do I’m well aware of the vocabulary, which I’m sure is unfamiliar to many non-Black readers. Though it’s not just a matter of terms or phrases: Black women often encounter unprovoked opinions and wrong assumptions from employers, strangers — even family and friends — about what their hairstyle says about their professionalism, their social status or their relationship to Blackness.The personal, cultural and political implications of Black hair are at the root of the well-meaning but less than inspired “The Glorious World of Crowns, Kinks and Curls.” (And yes, pun definitely intended.)Written by Keli Goff and produced by and filmed at Baltimore Center Stage, “Crowns, Kinks and Curls” is a series of vignettes, each one featuring a Black woman recounting how her hair affected her school life, relationships or career. The piece channels the spirit of Ntozake Shange’s “For Colored Girls,” though the writing, albeit earnest, is far less poetic.The actresses Stori Ayers, Awa Sal Secka and Shayna Small embody all of the fictional women, donning different do’s to do so. (Nikiya Mathis handled the eclectic mix of hair and wig designs.) Most of the scenes are monologues, though occasionally two or three women meet, say, in the office of a mostly white law firm, where an older straight-haired lawyer named Sharon (Ayers) berates a younger one, Ally (Sal Secka), for wearing her hair in braids: “I’m sorry, I can’t let you meet a major client looking like this.”Gaby (Small), with sleek face-hugging Josephine Baker-style finger waves, recalls her mother’s distress that she cut her “good hair” for her wedding day, showing how hair reflects the generational trauma held by some Black women. Wanda (Ayers), in bouncy mocha and champagne blonde curls, recounts how an ex-boyfriend reproached her for pressing her natural hair for an interview, illustrating how “authentic Blackness” is often policed even within the Black community.And so every tale has its moral, none of which should be new to any Black woman. They certainly weren’t for me, a woman who has had white people make awkward comments about my hair, ask questions and even ask to touch my crown in admiration.Which is to say “Crowns, Kinks and Curls” excited me more conceptually than it did in its actual execution, which was all perfectly serviceable, from the performances to Bianca LaVerne Jones’s staging, to Dede Ayite’s set, with a big, puzzling backdrop of large flowers.Scenes span recent history, some taking place during the Obama Administration and others referencing former President Trump and 2019’s Crown Act against hair-based discrimination. These glimmers of vibrancy underscore the timeliness of the topic, given how the social consciousness of Blackness has shifted since the Obama era.In one humorous monologue, Sal Secka, wearing an Afro pony — ethereal and exquisitely cloudlike — plays a woman named Adaora who has accompanied her biracial daughter to see the royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle and cheer on the Black princess.In a somber scene, two unnamed women (Sal Secka and Ayers) unwrap and unpin their hair in silence, as “Strange Fruit” is sung offstage; they are preparing to go to a funeral for a Black husband and son unjustly killed. It’s the one sequence in which hair is not so explicitly the topic of discussion, but rather is powerfully positioned as part of a larger expression of the Black experience, particularly at this moment in history.In a somber scene, Stori Ayers unwraps and unpins her hair in silence.Diggle/Baltimore Center StageThe show’s program includes a brief timeline of the history of Black women’s hairstyles and hair practices, referencing enslaved women’s use of head wraps and braids before enduring the Middle Passage, along with the work of hair pioneers like Madam C.J. Walker and George E. Johnson Sr. There’s so much to be mined in the history of Black hair that “Crowns, Kinks and Curls” feels like it has missed opportunities to go further — or even incorporate real stories.Why not use the smart, funny and vulnerable voices of real Black women? Why not devise scenes that are more than neatly prepared monologues?And because it is a rarity to see Black women talking about their Black hair onstage, what I saw only made me hungry for more: I wanted to see more Black women of different shades, in not only wigs and weaves but also their own natural ‘fros. I was disappointed, in scenes where women were supposed to be wearing natural hair, to see false approximations.I believe this very capable show — which had a creative team entirely comprising Black women, to my utter delight — can be more. I hope it happens if and when it’s staged in person, as it’s the kind of work I both want and need to see, as a Black female critic and as a Black woman writing about an art form that too often fails people of color.So as I undid my own head of flat twists this weekend in preparation for a much-needed trip to the salon, this earnest request crossed my mind: more Black women, and more (and more and more) of those curls.The Glorious World of Crowns, Kinks and CurlsThrough April 18; centerstage.org More