Good Morning America host Lara Spencer laughed at Prince George (aged 6), the future King of England, for taking ballet classes.
The best thing about her ignorant comments is the support it brought out for dance — including from Lara Spencer.
.@LaraSpencer You are in a very responsible & honorable business. Clearly you lost it 8/22. Insulting the arts & being totally misinformed of the amazing strength and medical shape sportsmen find when they study ballet. 1/2
— Chita Rivera (@Chita_Rivera) August 25, 2019
Lara Spencer says that talking to Robbie Fairchild, Fabrice Calmels and Travis Wall helped turn her ballet comments into a teachable moment.
In a fascinating Facebook post, former Times dance critic Alastair Macaulay points out that ballet is in Prince George’s blood. “…the practice of ballet by various European royal families is famous and centuries-old.”
Travis Wall, left (of “So You Think You Can Dance.”) and Robbie Fairchild (star of An American in Paris on Broadway) held a class for dancers of all ages and genders in Times Square — near the studios of “Good Morning America”
. “I think so much good can come out of this as long as we remain people who are able to forgive,” Fairchild told the Times. “It’s also such a divisive society. Who are going to be the people to try and bridge gaps? Artists.”
Ticket Giveaway – One day left!
Remember the time when something went wrong in the theater? Describe an incident you witnessed or were involved in as a theatergoer or theater artist, for a chance to win two free tickets to The Play That Goes Wrong”
Broadway Poll: Most Anticipated Fall 2019 Show?
The Week in New York Theater Reviews
Rebel Verses. Teenagers on Stage, Not Mean, Not Chill, Just Real.
Labyrinth’s “Installation on America” in support of Latinx at the Border
Watch Richard Nelson’s Uncle Vanya, via WNET’s Theater Close Up
Books: Broadway and the Blacklist. The Chelsea Girls
it would be misleading to call “The Chelsea Girls” simply a novel about Broadway and the blacklist, for several reasons – the main being a surprise twist in the plot more than halfway through the novel…that sent me hunting for an actual history book of the era, which I found, to my delight, in the newly published Broadway and the Blacklist
The Week in New York Theater News
Cary Grant, Clare Boothe Luce & Aldous Huxley take LSD together in
Lincoln Center Theater’s “Flying Over Sunset” a new musical by writer/director James Lapine, music by Tom Kitt, lyrics by Michael Korie. It stars Carmen Cusack, Tony Yazbeck, Harry Hadden-Patton. It opens April 16, 2020 at the Vivian Beaumont.
Two Broadway revivals of groundbreaking shows from Roundabout:
A Soldier’s Play, by Charles Fuller, directed by Kenny Leon, with Blair Underwood and David Alan Grier. It opens January 21 at American Airlines Theater
“Caroline, or Change,” the musical by Jeanine Tesori and Tony Kushner, starring Sharon D. Clarke, in a production imported from the West End, opens April 7, 2020 at Studio 54
For details check out my Broadway 2019-2020 Season Preview Guide
Eleven years after its Broadway debut, “Slava’s Snowstorm,” a surreal and colorful family show, returns for a holiday run, November 11 – January 5, at the Stephen Sondheim
“Performance for One,” a 10-minute play FREE for one audience member at a time, presented from Sept 6 through Nov 3 by Edward Einhorn
‘s Untitled Theater Company 61, celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Raúl Esparza and Krysta Rodriguez will star in “Seared” by Theresa Rebeck, along with W. Tré Davis and David Mason, opening October 28 at MCC Theater.
2020 City Center Encores
Douglass Sills and Alexandra Socha in Mack & Mabel by Jerry Herman/Michael Stewart.Feb 19–23
Kate Baldwin and Brian Stokes Mitchell in Love Life by Kurt Weill/Alan Jay Lerner March 18–22
Ashley Park in Thoroughly Modern Millie by Dick Scanlan and
Jeanine Tesori May 6– 10
The winners of the 2019 Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival (OOB), the nation’s premier short play competition:
Tidwell, Or The Plantation Play by Rodney Witherspoon II
A Small Breach In Protocol In Big Rick’s Rockin’ Skydive Academy by Daniel Hirsch
I LOVE YOU ST. PETERSBURG! by Bixby Elliot
Stay For Dinner by Becky McLaughlin
Bunkmates by Jeff Ronan
Cluck Deluxe by Bonnie Antosh
Titus Burgess to perform the music of Stephen Sondheim at
Carnegie Hall 2/1/2020. Use special offer code: Titusfan
Sarah Bockeland Cory Jeacoma begin performances September 5 as Carole King and Gerry Goffin for the final nine weeks of Beautiful – The Carole King Musical at the Stephen Sondheim Theater
Playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is against trigger warnings that give away key aspects of his plays. “I don’t think people actually want this. People who are afraid of things like that don’t go to the theater. It’s blood sport, guys.” pic.twitter.com/bxOvd3SVvj
— New York Theater (@NewYorkTheater) August 22, 2019
