Barry Manilow
Today marks the final concert in singer/songwriter Barry Manilow’s limited Broadway engagement, Manilow on Broadway. A Grammy Award-winning icon whose greatest successes came in the late ’70s and early ’80s, Manilow has maintained a devoted fan base over the decades, and they came out in droves to see the New York native play at the St. James Theatre. Impressively, his popularity has remained strong enough to sustain several weeks of performances.
Though the venue for Manilow on Broadway is a Broadway theater, the show is really a concert, not a theatrical production. But Broadway theaters offer artists like Manilow and their fans a more intimate and classier alternative to New York City’s standard concert venues.
Manilow on Broadway got off to a somewhat bumpy start as the singer had to cancel a few early performances due to illness. But fortunately Barry Manilow quickly recovered and was able to reschedule the missed concerts. The many hit songs featured in the concerts include “I Write the Songs,” “Copacabana (At the Copa),” and of course “Mandy”.
Already a respected comic actress and improv performer due to her extensive work in films like Christopher Guest’s Best in Show, and now a well-known TV star thanks to her role on Glee, Jane Lynch is soon to add Broadway to her resume. Later this spring, Lynch will make her Broadway debut in the well-received Broadway revival of the musical Annie, now playing at the Palace Theatre.
The spotlight will be shining on the female characters who have made Broadway grand in the upcoming PBS broadcast of Kristin Chenoweth: The Dames of Broadway … All of ‘Em!, set to air on March 24.
One of this Broadway season’s few original new musicals, Hands on a Hardbody starts preview performances at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre today. Inspired by a real-life competition, Hands on a Hardbody is about 10 Texans who spend days in the heat keeping at least one hand on a beautiful new truck in an effort to win it.
Holland Taylor (TV’s Two and a Half Men) brings her one-woman play Ann to Broadway. Both starring and written by Taylor, Ann is starting preview performances at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theater.
The producers of the planned Broadway revival of the musical Pump Boys and Dinettes have announced that the production won’t be coming to Broadway this season. The show was supposed to start performances at the Circle in the Square Theatre on March 19. A new date has not been set yet.
The winners of the 55th Annual Grammy Awards have been announced, and the Best Musical Tony Award-winning Once came out on top with the Best Musical Theater Album honor. Produced by Steven Epstein and Martin Lowe (also the show’s music supervisor and Tony winning orchestrator), the original cast recording was released on the Masterworks label and features the talents of singers Steve Kazee and Cristin Milioti, among others. The show’s songs were written by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova.