New York Theater Week of July 9-16, 2012

Richard Fleeshman from Ghost with Sharon Osbourne
Richard Fleeshman from Ghost, reenacting pottery wheel scene with Sharon Osbourne on The Talk.

The actor is Richard Fleeshman, star of Ghost the musical, reenacting the pottery wheel scene with a lascivious Sharon Osbourne in a recent appearance on TV’s The Talk. His shirt is now the property of the winner of my Ghost giveaway contest, which surely was a highlight in this past week in New York theater for her. But there were other highlights:

Monday, July 9, 2012

Grace with Paul Rudd, Ed Asner, Michael Shannon has a home on Broadway,the Cort, starting September 13th, and on Twitter: @GraceOnBroadway.

Freud’s Last Session closes on July 22 after 2 years. Dr. Ruth Westheimer saw it eight times, and the playwright then wrote a play about HER.

Bernard Gersten will retire after 28 years as executive director of Lincoln Center Theater  in June 2013. Nobody will take the title afterwards

Nina Arianda has been cast to play Janis Joplin in a forthcoming film. 1. I don’t see it. 2. Does this mean we’ve lost Arianda to the movies?

Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Peter O’Toole has retired.
Isn’t it a wonderful profession that someone can announce his retirement from it at age 79, and it makes news.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012


Magical moments in theater, selected from more than one 100 responses
“When Phantom disappears at the end, I was all “HOW DID THEY DO THAT?! That’s some voodoo shit’”
“Even though I could see the wires and knew how it all happened I was still in awe and in tears
“[You don’t need] fancy wires or pyrotechnics to create beautiful magic onstage.”

Yet another new theater on 42nd St., Elektra (673 8th Ave.), to house Silence the Musical moving from downtown. Starts July 18

13 Playwrights Inc (13p), under artistic director Sarah Ruhl, is successful.So why is it ending?That was the plan

Robert Cuccioli,who played Jekyll/Hyde, replaces Patrick Page as Norman Osborn /Green Goblin in Spider-Man starting Aug 7

Actress Kristin Chenoweth hospitalized tonight after hit by falling lighting equipment on the set of The Good Wife in Brooklyn

Thursday, July 12, 2012
The Heiress (@TheHeiressBway) begins Oct 7 at Walter Kerr, w/ Jessica Chastain, Judith Ivy, Dan Stevens (Matthew Crawley of Downton Abbey!)

Randy Harrison, (Justin in “Queer As Folk”), is all grown up & joining cast of

Broadway in Bryant Park

Joey the horse from War Horse visits Broadway in Bryant Park
Joey from War Horse in Broadway in Bryant Park

I hope Joey from War Horse doesn’t get heat stroke

The videos of cast members performing
Phantom of the Opera


Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark

The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess

Friday, July 13, 2012
NBA legend Earvin “Magic” Johnson, fresh from Magic/Bird defeat, has bought rights for Bway musical about TV show “Soul Train”

“Interactive theatre is taking the audience experience to new & often extreme places” ~UK critic Lyn Gardner

My review in Back Stage of Rio the Musical, a production in the New York Musical Theatre Festival, setting “Oliver Twist” in the  corrupt slums of contemporary Brazil during Carnaval.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Ben Vereen, Bernadette Peters with dog in Broadway Barks 2012
Ben Vereen, Bernadette Peters and “Mick Jagger” at Broadway Barks 14


Broadway Barks 14
, in which founders and hosts Bernadette Peters and Mary Tyler Moore pair up adorable pets with adorable Broadway performers. All that adorableness packaged in a seven-minute video.

Sunday, July 15, 2012
My Back Stage review of Probation at Repertorio Espanol, which is best viewed as an even-handed exploration of the varying world views of a Cuban exile in Miami versus a next-generation Cuban born and raised in Cuba.

Celeste Holm has died at age 95. She played the original amorous country girl Ado Annie of “Oklahoma,” and 23 other shows on Broadway. She won an Academy Award for her role in “Gentleman’s Agreement” but is probably best-known as the playwright’s wife in the classic film of New York theater, “All About Eve.”
“I walked onto the set and there’s Bette and I say ‘Good Morning,’ and she said, ‘Oh, shit, good manners,’ and I felt as if I’d been hit in the face with a wet flounder and I never spoke to her again….”

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Author: New York Theater

Jonathan Mandell is a 3rd generation NYC journalist, who sees shows, reads plays, writes reviews and sometimes talks with people.

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