First Class
assassination,
and Wit, about a
professor having
an experimental
cancer treatment);
light comedies (
Private Lives, a Noel
Coward classic);
and a whole bunch
of marquee names.
Samuel L. Jackson and Angela
Bassett are the stars
of The Mountaintop.
Private Lives has
Kim Cattrell. On
a Clear Day You
Can See Forever
stars Harry Connick Jr., Follies has Broad-
way darling Bernadette Peters, and Frank
Langella will play the man in Man and Boy.
And that’s not to mention one of the most
highly anticipated dramas of the season,
Relatively Speaking, in which John Turturro
makes his Broadway directing debut with
three one-act comedies: Honeymoon Hotel by
Woody Allen (about a wedding day), Talking
Cure by Ethan Coen (about family insanity)
and George is Dead by Elaine May (about the
humor of death).
“There’s always the question about star
power,” says St. Martin, “and we have a lot
of star power coming.” But there are plenty
of shows that have succeeded without them.
“The big hits of the spring don’t have any
stars in them.”
She’s talking about The Book of Mormon,
in particular. The runaway hit—a foul-
mouthed, hilarious musical about two young
Mormon missionaries by South Park duo
Trey Parker and Matt Stone and composer
Robert Lopez—was nominated for 14 Tony
Awards and won nine.
Seats are nearly impossible to get, but
tickets are selling briskly for most of Broadway as well. For the 2010 to 2011 season,
which began May 24, 2010, and ended May
29, 2011, Broadway shows yielded more than
a billion dollars, $1,080,562,880 to be exact,
in grosses, and total attendance reached
12,534,595. Both are up more than 5 percent,
giving Broadway its best year ever.
Certainly, it seems, there is a lot of thunder left for the holidays.
“We broke all records this year,” says St.
Martin. “And I think next year we may do it
again.” —Liz Johnson
Samuel L. Jackson
portrays Dr. Martin
Luther King in The
New This
Season
Bonnie & Clyde
A musical about
the infamous bank
robbers-lovers
Schoenfeld,
opens Dec. 1
Chinglish
From Chicago, a play
about an American
businessman trying
to expand into China
Longacre Theatre,
on now
The Mountaintop
Samuel L. Jackson
stars in this fictional
re-creation of events
the night before Dr.
Martin Luther King’s
assassination
Bernard B. Jacobs,
closes Jan. 15
On a Clear Day
You Can See
Forever
Harry Connick Jr. in
a refigured revival
musical about love,
music and a past life
St. James, opens Dec. 11
Private Lives
Kim Cattrell in Noel
Coward’s comedy
about a divorced
couple who discover
they are honeymooning with their
new spouses in the
same hotel.
Music Box,
opens Nov. 17
Seminar
A dark comedy with
Alan Rickman as the
mentor to four young
writers
Golden Theater,
opens Nov. 20
Follies
Bernadette Peters
in the Tony Award-winning musical
about a revue’s cast
members reuniting
on the eve of the
theater’s demise
Marquis, on now
Other Desert
Cities
Rachel Griffiths plays
the daughter of a
Republican back
home with the family
(Stockard Channing,
Judith Light) for the
holidays
Booth, opens Nov. 3
Stick Fly
A well-off African
American family is
home in Martha’s
Vineyard
Cort, opens Dec. 8
Godspell
The 1970s musical
based on the Gospel
of Matthew
Circle in the Square,
opens Nov. 7
Relatively
Speaking
John Turturro directs
three one-act plays,
written by Woody
Allen, Ethan Coen
and Elaine May
Brooks Atkinson,
on now
Venus in Fur
At an audition, where
sex is as important
as the tryout
Samuel J. Friedman,
closes Dec. 11
Man and Boy
A businessman
(Frank Langella) and
his musician son
clash about ideals
American Airlines,
closes Nov. 27
Steve
Guttenberg,
Marlo Thomas
and Mark
Linn-Baker
star in
Relatively
Speaking.
What can you say about a boy and his
horse? For theatergoers this season,
the answer has been a resounding
round of applause. War Horse, based
on a novel and now a feature film
directed by Steven Spielberg, won
this year’s Tony for best play, and continues to astonish audiences with its
fantastic scenery and puppetry. What
is so clearly a puppet in the opening
moments of the play quickly becomes,
or so it seems, a real live horse, prancing around the stage at the Vivian
Beaumont Theater. You have to see to
believe. warhorseonbroadway.com
