“M” Theater. Robert Massimi .
Broadway Vs. Covid
In a Broadway season that had its ups and downs, there is a new concern on Broadway…the new variant that has hit our country.
with Covid 19, The Delta Variant and now Omicron, many houses are shutting for one or two days. The virus has hit the Rockettes
so hard that they cancelled their show for this year. At “Moulin Rouge” Thursday night, the audience was seated only to be told to
go home because cast members tested positive for Covid. Last night two members of the audience upchucked during the per-
formance, that led the show to stop for the night. New York, New Jersey and Connecticut have all been hit with a bad flu that’s go-
ing around. Producers, to be safe are closing shows as to not be taking chances.
If Broadway does not have enough problems, Goldman Sachs just had 24 people test positive for Tuberculosis. It is not clear as to
what will happen after the new year to Broadway but right now producers are “papering” the audience (free tickets to fill seats),
they are discounting tickets as low as $29.99 a seat leaving producers struggling to survive. As a producer myself, I would not con-
sider bringing a play either on or off Broadway. The uncertainty of running a show for its duration and the iffy ness of closing and
reopening from night to night is not an enjoyable to see or produce theater. Thetaers suffered another blow when the mayor man-
dated children over 5 years old to be vaccinated; this killed the tourist audience quite a bit as well.
One Of A Kind
Stephen Sondheim was one of the important figures in 20th-century musical theater; some actually credit Sondheim for reinventing
the American musical. Sondheim tackled themes beyond traditional subjects; his music and lyrics were of unprecedented com-
plexity and sophistication. His shows were considered “darker” than the musicals of his time period… “Sweeney Todd” as exam-
ple.
Born in New York City in 1930, Sondheim attended Williams College; he would start his musical career by writing the lyrics for
“West Side Story” (1957) and “Gypsy (1959). He would later go on to write : “Company”, “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to
the Forum”, “Follies”, “A Little Night Music”, “Sweeny Todd”, “Merrily We Roll Along”, “Sunday In The Park With George” and “Into
The Woods”.
Sondheim won eight Tony Awards, an Academy Award, a Pulitzer and in 2015 the Presidential Medal of Freedom. After seeing
Irving Berlin’s revue called “Cheek to Cheek”, it had me reflecting on Sondheim who at 91 died on Friday. Few great writers like
Berlin and Sondheim even come close to the way these men wrote. Sondheim, however, was in my generation and I saw almost
all of his shows more than once. Sondheim was a versatile writer, deep, dark and always had a strong meaning to his words and
music. He worked until the day he died; he was known for attending workshops where he encouraged many young writers (he was
just featured attending a workshop in the Netflix film: “Tick, Tick, Boom”).
I do not know how many years it will take to replace Sondheim on Broad
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