Video Interviews/Photos: Shoshana Medney                        Curtain Call   EMOJILAND opened at The Duke on 42nd Street on Monday, January 19 to a cheering audience of enthusiastic fans. Written by Laura Shein and Keith Harrison the cast includes Lesli Margherita, Josh...

by Marcina Zaccaria   Wild Dogs Under My Skirt begins with the presentation a large knife, with a long, thick blade not curved like a hatchet or scythe.  The Wild is presented as a place where the gnashing of teeth co-mingles with a call to a smoky beyond.  Six performers throw snappy...

      By Samuel L. Leiter   Emojis! Those ubiquitous computer images we attach to our emails offering shortcut messages showing feelings, foods, celebrations, machines, weather, flags, animals, and nearly anything we experience or come in contact with and want to share. No...

By Ron Fassler It’s hard to believe that the musical revue Forbidden Broadway began in 1982 at a tiny supper club on West 72nd Street on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. In the intervening 38 years there have been nearly as many iterations (including the L.A.-based Forbidden Hollywood edition...

By Michael Tingley Before me, a tire, laying on mossy turf. A couch, tilted backward, slashed underneath. A bathtub. And, most strikingly, a pond— or a puddle more exactly. Something like a cool forest pool that, amidst the flotsam, turns menacing. The puddle has a bridge of three planks...

  By Matt Smith   “There’s no harder role for an actor to play than yourself.” Such is the bold declaration made by multi-faceted international entertainer Juan Pablo di Pace, toward the end of his self-titled solo show, which played the intimate The Green Room 42 last weekend....

    NYC Restaurant Week January 21 – February 9 is a celebration of NYC’s most fabulous pastime: dining out. With hundreds of restaurants throughout the City rolling out special prix-fixe menus for a limited time, this is your chance to revel without a cause. Explore...

    By Samuel L. Leiter   I was only five in 1945, but even then I was aware of five major events in that earthshaking year: the death of FDR, the atom bombs, the end of the war, my introduction to Broadway, and, finally, the crowning of Bess Myerson as the first (and, still,...

  By Ron Fassler The Green Room 42 in New York City played host to Ann Hampton Callaway channeling the song stylist and composer Peggy Lee. It was almost too perfect— in that one great singer was paying tribute to another, and as that is just my cup of tea, the drink was hot and...

  By Ron Fassler This new 90-minute play by Talene Monahon is not a how-to for those interested in learning the retro skill of loading a musket. But it does (as you might surmise) concern itself with those men and women who are into historical reenactment, be it the Revolutionary War...

  If It Only Even Runs A Minute Celebrates The Underappreciated Musicals of Hal Prince is the 18th edition of the Bistro Award-winning series of rare songs, behind-the-scenes tales, and inspiring photos from underappreciated Broadway and off-Broadway musicals—and its first with a theme!...

      by Meredith Ganzman   Her name is Lucy Barton. That’s who you’ll meet in the Manhattan Theatre Club’s US premiere of My Name is Lucy Barton, which stars the award-winning powerhouse, Laura Linney. The solo performance is a testament to Linney’s incredibly skilled...

      by Samuel L. Leiter   You know those CNN documentaries that cover an entire decade in an hour? “The Sixties”? “The Seventies”?  “The Eighties,” etc.? Film and video clips galore, talking heads, seriously dated advertisements, and reams of highlights from each era...

By Fay Simpson Occasionally one encounters, while sitting in the audience, a performer who is so fearless and unselfconscious that one can truly relax and let the messages being expressed on stage run through your senses and re-invigorate your life. Such was the effect of Elizabeth Parrish’s...

By Tania Fisher The devotees of one of this century’s greatest comic talents flocked to fill Feinstein’s/54 Below as they celebrated the great Mel Brooks. The rollicking, joyous evening was hosted by Richard Kind— perhaps one of only few men on the planet who can get a hearty laugh just from...

  by: Carole Di Tosti   As the Founder and Producing Artistic Director of the International WOW Company, Josh Fox has written/directed/produced three award-nominated and award-winning films, two about fracking: Gasland I (2010) and Gasland Part II (2013). His third film, How to Let...

    by Samuel L. Leiter   Eva O’Connor’s patchy, pro-choice dramedy, Maz and Bricks, now at 59E59 Theaters as part of Origin’s First Irish, is yet another example of the current trend that uses one of theatre’s hoariest devices, the aside, as a playwriting tool sharing an...

  Diana producers Grove Entertainment (Beth Williams), Frank Marshall and The Araca Group announced today the complete cast for Diana, the upcoming new musical which begins previews on Monday, March 2, 2020, and opens on Tuesday, March 31, 2020, at the Longacre Theatre (220 West...

Hosted by the actress/comedienne Julie Halston, BROADWAY BELTS FOR PFF! will hold its special tenth-anniversary fundraiser, featuring an evening of the hottest music and comedy in town to benefit the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation (PFF). This year’s event will honor 10-time Tony-Award Winning...

    The press met with the cast and creatives of Romeo & Bernadette: A Musical Tale of Verona and Brooklyn and Theater Pizzazz’ Magda Katz was on the scene. Amas Musical Theatre (Donna Trinkoff, Artistic Producer) in association with Eric Krebs presents the Off-Broadway...

    by Carol Rocamora   In London theatre this season, women reign supreme. Whether they’re playing duchesses or demons, spirits or sisters, matriarchs or maidens, they project images of power, courage, and resilience. At the Royal National Theatre, actresses Niamh Cusack and...

      The cast and producer met with the press and TheaterPizzzazz.com today at The Club Car at the McKittrick Hotel, while in rehearsals, to talk about the upcoming reimagined production, back to its pub roots from 30 years ago where it was first presented for a three week run...

    Performances of Michael Jackson the Musical (MJ the Musical) begin at the Neil Simon Theatre on July 6th. Now is your chance to show your stuff! MJ the musical has announced a multi-city search for actors of all ages, including young performers to play Michael Jackson at age...

    There’s no doubt that Daniel Fish is creative, free thinking and gets into the nitty gritty of a musical as evidenced by the Tony Award winning Oklahoma! that won Best Revival of a Musical in 2019. His forte is deconstructing, getting rid of what he considers the...

  HOW DID THAT HAPPEN SO QUICKLY?  WE’RE ALL ASKING THE SAME QUESTION BUT HERE IT IS . . . THE BEGINNING OF A NEW YEAR. FROM ALL OF US AT THEATERPIZZAZZ.COM TO ALL OF YOU . . . WISHING EVERYONE A PEACEFUL, HEALTHY AND OPTIMISTIC NEW YEAR. HERE’S TO 2020!   Sandi Durell...

                    Sandra Bernhard: Sandy’s Holiday Extravaganza-A Decade of Madness and Mayhem   by Carole Di Tosti   Sandra Bernhard is a performer, actress, singer and author who never receded from the public eye since she became known for her stand-up comedy. Her break-out came...

          By JK Clarke   As a society, here in the US of A, it’s fair to say we hardly spend much time thinking about Idaho. Sure, there’s the odd joke or two about potatoes and the acknowledgement of the first rate skiing in the craggy Cascades; but what goes...

  In the Tradition of MetroStar and Mama’s Next Big Act, Comes Spoonfed’s Talent Challenge 2020 Aspiring Singers compete Mondays, Jan. 20th, 27th and February 3rd, 10th, 17th, 24th   Producer Joseph Macchia (Metrostar Talent Challenge and MetroMinor), and proprietor of...

      By Sandi Durell   Happy New Year Everyone! Can it almost/already be 2020? We can’t stop the clock but with the slew of cabaret entertainment ahead in January and February you’ll want to stop and see some spectacular shows and talent. A small sampling awaits you here!...

      By Myra Chanin   Fyvush Finkel of Blessed Memory was a very fortunate man. He lived long enough to achieve stardom in several venues during his over 8-decade journey from Second Avenue to Broadway to Hollywood. A TV series  “finally after 51 years,” allowed him to...

    By Marilyn Lester   Remember the connect-the-dots games you played as a kid? Wasn’t it fun to see what image was eventually revealed? Just as much fun was following the trail of links between singer-actress Maureen Taylor and librettist-lyricist Michael Colby. Cosmic...

    WISHING YOU AND YOURS A HAPPY HOLIDAY SEASON . . . PEACE ON EARTH . . . GOOD HEALTH AND SWEET TIMES. FROM ALL OF US AT THEATER PIZZAZZ – HERE’S TO YOU!  ...

      by Matt Smith   With a stage outfitted with Christmas trees and a backdrop bathed in red and green, it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas at The Green Room 42… and who better to help ring in the Yuletide season than singular Broadway legend Andrea...

  By Brian Scott Lipton   Rarely has there been as much truth in advertising for a cabaret show than Michael Feinstein: Home for the Holidays. First, the legendary crooner is performing in his New York home, Feinstein’s/54 Below, and the singer has never seemed more relaxed in his...

    By Marilyn Lester   For those who yearn for a Dickensian Christmas, who appreciate the enduring classics of English language theater, or simply want a good time, London Assurance is just the ticket. Thanks to casting perfection and astute, nuanced direction by Charlotte...

  By Samuel L. Leiter   I did not see the 2016 movie, Sing Street, written and directed by John Carney (also responsible for the somewhat similar Once), before visiting the new musical based on it at the New York Theatre Workshop (NYTW). The show, with a book by Enda Walsh (who did...

  by Linda Amiel Burns   On December 20, 2019, Carnegie Hall was sold out for The New York Pops Annual Holiday Celebration featuring singers Tony Desare, Capathia Jenkins, Judith Clurman’s Essential Voices USA and led, for the 11th season, by Music Director and Conductor Steven...

  By Ron Fassler   Actress-singer-impressionist-radio show host and all-round super talent Christine Pedi brought her annual Christmas show “Snow Bizness” (the 12th!) to Feinstein’s/54 Below Friday night (with a repeat show on Sunday December 29th at 7:00 pm). If you’re looking for...

  by Sheila Watko   New York City is home to a number of beloved Christmas traditions: the Rockefeller Center tree, the Rockettes, the decked-out shop windows. But Feinstein’s/54 Below is home to a few additional Christmas traditions: a visit back in time to a place called Jackelope...

  by Brian Scott Lipton   New Yorkers have many age-old holiday traditions, from visiting Macy’s windows to going ice skating at Rockefeller Center. One of the newer, if equally delightful, ones is attending Tony Award nominee Norm Lewis’ annual Yuletide show at Feinstein’s/54...

    by Myra Chanin   I grew up in a Yiddish-speaking household where my parents, while fluent in English, loved Yiddish theater, so I saw my first play at the age of five. It was a music comedy with stock characters — a poor but honest boy who somehow acquired a winning...

  Theater Pizzazz’ Sandi Durell visited with Grammy winning and Emmy nominated Desmond Child at his New York digs to talk about his most recent live recording at Feinstein’s/54 Below – ‘Desmond Child Live’ – a first performance outing for Desmond after a 40 year absence from the stage,...

  By Barbara & Scott Siegel   The Inheritance Both Broadway and Off-Broadway can boast a considerable number of truly great plays dealing with the AIDs crisis — many of them written and produced while in the midst of its worst years. The Inheritance, written by Matthew Lopez, an...

    Tony Award Winner star of The Prom and The Drowsey Chaperone, Beth Leavel, will return to Feinstein’s/54 Below in “Thirteen Shows & Counting – It’s Not About Me” on January 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 20 at 7 pm. She’s what we call Hot Stuff ....

  by Brian Scott Lipton   Few people define the word multi-talented as well as Austin Pendleton. An acclaimed writer, director and, yes, singer, Pendleton – who turns 80 next March –continues to work practically non-stop. (In fact, we spoke while he was on a break from performing in...

An Amusement Column       by Harry Haun     THE DIRECTOR AS WHIRLING DERVISH It’s possible to mistake director Carl Andress for a visible blur these days. Since Thanksgiving, he’s been in Workaholic Heaven, gamely juggling three shows at once. Two of them come due...

  By Brian Scott Lipton   Bronx-born Lea Michele quickly became one of Broadway’s brightest stars at age 10 as Tateh’s daughter in the original production of Ragtime, along with performing numerous roles in the original production of Les Miserables and, later, Shrpintze in the 2004...

    by Alix Cohen   Ed Dixon’s fifty plus years as a well traveled actor of diverse talent has reaped a wealth of lively experience. His translation of this into brief O’Henryish anecdotes presented with self effacing humor and theatrical timing creates an enjoyable evening....

  Interview/Filming: Magda Katz   J. Robert Spencer rose to fame when he created the role of Four Seasons bassist,  Nick Massi in the Tony Award- and Grammy Award-winning show Jersey Boys, with additional credits beyond as an independent film director, producer, writer and singer....

    by Edward Medina   There’s a joyfully festive noise ringing out uptown and its coming from The Classical Theatre of Harlem’s production of A Christmas Carol in Harlem. It’s that time of year when theatre companies across the country pull out their volumes of the Charles...

    By Marilyn Lester   Is there a soul alive who hasn’t wondered about the great mystery of life beyond the grave? Judging from the volume of thought recorded over the millennia of human existence, the answer to that question is a vigorous “who hasn’t!” The desire to...

By Marcina Zaccaria   Right on time for the holidays, Adrienne Haan brought sparkle to the stage in White Christmas at the Triad, and the music of Irving Berlin sounded grand. For those profoundly moved by the songs such as “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm,” “Happy Holiday,” and of...

  By Matt Smith   “Christmas is my favorite time of year. As the beauty of the season surrounds us, it’s quite exciting. However, sometimes we take the holidays for granted. And even when we think we have things all figured out, we realize we don’t.” Such is the plight at the center...

by Carol Rocamora   Once in a while, a powerful play blows in from the past to hit you with the force of a gale wind. Such is the case of Judgment Day, Ödön von Horváth’s chilling 1937 moral fable about a crime unwittingly committed by a stationmaster in a small town near the...

      By Ron Fassler   Sam Harris has been entertaining audiences now since 1983, when he was the first winner of the syndicated series Star Search, which preceded American Idol and America’s Got Talent… and all the other competition shows that have come since. His singing...

  Interview/Filming/Photos: Magda Katz Sketch: Joan Chiverton   Seth Sikes will celebrate New Year’s Eve at Feinstein’s/54 Below on Tuesday, December 31 at 7:00PM in “Twenty ‘20s Songs for 2020,” an entirely brand new show that will celebrate songs made famous nearly a hundred years...

    Dr. Barbara Ann Teer’s National Black Theatre (NBT) hosted a special evening of community gathering on Slave Play on Monday as it convened a town hall to discuss the critically acclaimed Broadway phenomenon by playwright Jeremy O. Harris. The intimate event, which included...

    By Steve Nardoni   NYU Skirball, the theater venue of New York University, has a declared mission to “present work that inspires, yet frustrates, confirms yet confounds, entertains, yet upends.” They have succeeded with The Builders Association’s Elements of Oz which...

Interview/Filming/Photos: Magda Katz Sketch by Joan Chiverton       Funny lady, radio personality Christine Pedi – you hear her on Sirius XM – will return to Feinstein’s54 Below with her delicious comedy show, with at least a dozen famous ‘friends’...

    by Scott and Barbara Siegel   A Christmas Carol at The Lyceum Theater… It is rare that we go to the theater with anything but enthusiasm and hope, always expecting/wanting to be joyfully entertained, if not uplifted and/or moved. But here we were, booked to see yet another...

      By Fay Simpson   Against the backdrop of the Washington Heights riots of 1992, our cast of unhinged characters are found in a Church, not quite in-the-Heights site specific but close enough, in the well worn Church of The Center at West Park in A City of Refuge....

    By Brian Scott Lipton   Few of us would volunteer to spend three hours, perhaps even three minutes, with a group of foul-mouthed, potentially violent ex-cons, drug addicts and homeless women. Fortunately, art doesn’t always imitate life, so I suggest you immediately grab a...

  By Barbara & Scott Siegel   While Broadway ticket sales this year are lagging slightly behind last year’s robust business, the actual income this year is somewhat higher than last year because ticket prices (believe it or not) are yet still higher. One would think that the...

    By Marilyn Lester   As you enter 59E59’s Theater B, the star of One November Yankee is remarkably and stunningly apparent—a full-sized, single-engine, yellow Piper J-3 Cub, crashed nose down, but mostly intact. The little plane’s serial number, 241-NY, which gives title to...

  Tony nominated star of Porgy & Bess, Sweeney Todd, Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera NORM LEWIS ,will bring his brand of Holiday cheer to Feinstein’s/54 Below beginning December 17 thru December 22 at 7 pm with Joseph Joubert on piano. Lewis is a magnetic entertainer with...

  By Myra Chanin   The final Friday night of November marked the peak of 2019’s entertainment year for me! It’s when Ricky Ritzel’s Broadway and his More than Ready for Primetime Players vanish like Brigadoon, fortunately only for 63 days, not a century. His delightful monthly...

    Photos/Filming: Magda Katz   Harry Townsend’s Last Stand opened at NYC Center Stage II on December 4 and Theater Pizzazz was on the scene and at the after party. The heartwarming yet sorrowful play with Len Cariou and Craig Bierko, written by George Eastman and...

              The cast and creatives of Anything Can Happen at the Theater: the Musical World of Maury Yeston, opened at the York Theatre last night to big applause from the audience and continued at the after-party at LIPS where the food and beverage flowed...

An Amusement Column     by Harry Haun   CATHY AND HEATHCLIFF, TOGETHER AGAIN—FINALLY!   Once upon a buffet line, 20 years ago, at the Cannes Film Festival, Rosemary Harris crossed paths with The Paley Center’s archival super-sleuth, Jane Klain, and inquired if she’d come...

  By Meredith Ganzman   Everything’s there in the new musical Jagged Little Pill, featuring the award-winning music of Alanis Morissette. Troubled characters, a slew of the singer-songwriter’s singles – 23 to be exact – and a topical story ripe with relevant issues. And...

    By Ron Fassler   It’s true that “Anything Can Happen in the Theatre.” It’s one of the reasons those attend it heavily (or even lightly) and who go hoping that something magical might happen at any given moment. After all, at the movies, the 2:00pm show will always go the...

        By Adam Cohen   Seth Rudetsky held court at the Town Hall with Broadway royalty Jessie Mueller and Megan Hilty as part of his second annual concert series. The event was held in support of Sandy Hook Promise, an organization dedicated to honoring all victims...

    By Sandi Durell   This is not a new story but playwright George Eastman puts a comfortable light-hearted spin on the topic of aging, losing a symbiotic spouse, dealing with child-parent relationships and leavening the loss, heartbreak and survival of aging with comedy. Such...

        By Samuel L. Leiter   A “red herring,” says Wikipedia, “is something that misleads or distracts from a relevant or important question. It may be either a logical fallacy or a literary device that leads readers or audiences toward a false conclusion.” In a...

    By Sandi Durell   “I’m one lucky guy” says Grammy and Emmy Award winning Steve Tyrell as he expresses both his gratitude for a dream life as a producer of recordings for some of the biggest and best in the industry – and that includes Dionne Warwick, Ray Charles, Linda...

  by David Tane   New York jazz lovers are a hardy lot. Braving the first snow storm of the season, a healthy crowd made its way downstairs to the Birdland Theatre for the Anderson Brothers’ salute to Cole Porter. It may have been cold outside but Will and Peter Anderson (Juilliard...

  by Carol Rocamora   “The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away….” It’s an age-old phrase, but when you hear it in The Young Man from Atlanta, Horton Foote’s deeply moving play about loss, it’s like hearing it for the first time. Will Kidder, Foote’s feisty protagonist, gets fired from...

  by Carol Rocamora   In the boldest theatrical stroke so far this season, playwright Tony Kushner has written himself into his own play! Granted that A Bright Room Called Day is an “old” play (his first, actually), and granted that its reviews were less than enthusiastic when it...

    by Harry Haun   RING THE DICKENS OUT OF THEM CHRISTMAS BELLS ‘Tis the season of bell-ringing and hand-wringing, and both acts are spiritedly in sync for the Broadway return of Charles Dickens’ Christmas ghost story, A Christmas Carol, now making merry at the Lyceum through...

    By Sandi Durell   If you’re a jazz aficionado and lover of the Great American Songbook, you’re in for the treat of your life as Veronica Swift, bebop and swing artist, places her own unique stamp on tunes that make our hearts sing. She’s young, she’s hip, she was born...

  by Hazen Cuyler   New Light Theater Project’s current production provides requisite holiday fare while exploring our alarming tendency to disappear from our loved ones lives. Charming and impactful, Everything is Super Great encourages togetherness by articulating the pain caused...

  By Myra Chanin   I arrived early at Don’t Tell Mama to watch Dean Benner and his Rockin’ Six-Piece Band’s Country Jukebox show and found myself at the end of a long line of compatriots who watched Mama’s Booking Manager Sidney Myer carrying unoccupied tables and chairs into Mama’s...

  by Adam Cohen   Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella is given an animated, electric revival at Paper Mill Playhouse. The production is absolutely top notch, highly entertaining and extremely fun. Children of all ages will find themselves smiling from the opening notes. The story,...

    By Sandi Durell     There is only one, no, two possibilities when it comes to Callaway . . . Liz and Ann Hampton . . . the extraordinary sisters who don’t look alike nor sound alike but make sister music like nobody else, setting the evening’s tone from sparkling,...

By Ron Fassler   Antonio Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” is one of the most famous and expressive compositions in the classical repertoire. First written and performed around 1716-1717, great portions of it are easily recognizable by virtue of its having been co-opted over the years by...

  By Myra Chanin   Renee Katz is a buoyant, optimistic Cabaret star whose powerful, rapturous, playful soprano reminds many of her fans of Barbara Cook because, like Cook, Renee Katz sings with her whole heart in the same exquisitely intimate way Cook did. She also reminds me of...

  By Samuel L. Leiter   American playwright Matthew Lopez’s (The Legend of Georgia McBride) marathon play, The Inheritance, directed by Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliott), comes to Broadway’s Ethel Barrymore Theatre after its multiple award-winning London run, produced by the Young Vic....

  By Argenis Ovalles     Step right up to a world of child-like wonder in Kit Goldstein Grant’s musical masterpiece, The Giant Hoax. Be ready to meet The Cardiff Giant (Daniel Moser). He doesn’t show himself for most part, but we do meet an imaginative version through Emily...

        By Sandi Durell   The cast and creative team of “Anything Can Happen in the Theater: The Musical World of Maury Yeston” met with the press at the York Theater today to present some of the musical numbers and provide interview time with Maury Yeston, Gerard...

  By Ron Fassler   Let’s start at the end, shall we? After entertaining a sold-out crowd at SubCulture in downtown Manhattan for nearly ninety minutes, Jason Robert Brown and Betty Buckley teased us with an introduction to their encore by detailing a story of how (after a...

  By Sandi Durell   The Green Room 42 was packed to the rafters with fans, friends and celebrities as the one and only host/impressario Daniel Dunlow welcomed the audience and Mark William unveiled his “grand sparklin” new show Feeling Good. William is on a track . . . the track to...

    by Edward Medina   At a time of great political uncertainty, in the shadow of an unprecedented presidential impeachment inquiry, in the wake of a two-party system wrenching the electorate this way and that with unceasingly maddening frequency, in the midst of all this...

    By Brian Scott Lipton   There can be no argument that Maury Yeston belongs in the pantheon of great musical theater composers. The 74-year-old New Jersey native has won Tony Awards for his scores of Nine and Titanic, as well as thrilled audiences with such shows as Phantom,...