Episodes

Going Beyond Broadway with author Stacy Wolf

Going Beyond Broadway with author Stacy Wolf

Go behind the scenes of ANNIE, LEGALLY BLONDE and more with Broadway's legendary animal trainer BILL BERLONI!

Lee Roy Remembers Hello, Dolly!, 42nd Street & the Genius of Gower Champion!

On Richard Rodgers, Agnes DeMille & Making Gay History in Applause

Lee Roy Reams remembers Fosse, Verdon, Gennaro and more!

With special guest -- Tony Award winner David Zippel

Part two of my conversation with Caseen Gaines, author of the new book, FOOTNOTES: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way

A conversation with Caseen Gaines, author of FOOTNOTES: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way

Today my guest is Rick Pender, author of The Stephen Sondheim Encyclopedia, the new and extraordinarily comprehensive guide to everything Sondheim.

Why are the great Musicals so unforgettable? Why do musicals have so much power and impact? How is it that they are able to live in our hearts and memories for a lifetime? In this Season One finale Episode Albert Evans and I tell our own stories of when, how, and why we fell in love with Broadway…

Musical theater is a very effective form for dramatizing entire communities of people – and often the community itself becomes a major character in the drama. Because of this natural ability, dozens of Broadway musicals - including many of the most popular, acclaimed and influential - focus nearl…

At least 30 popular and successful Broadway musicals have stories, plots and themes that explicitly deal with Equity, Justice, and Inclusion in regard to Race, Ethnicity and Culture. The great musicals that I profile today include The Red Moon, As Thousands Cheer, Show Boat, South Pacific, The Ki…

This is the second of two special holiday bonus episodes of Broadway Nation. In Part One we looked at how the Jewish-Russian immigrant songwriter, Irving Berlin -- in addition to being one of the prime inventors of the Broadway Musical -- also created an entirely new category of popular song: “the…

This week’s special holiday episode tells the story of how the great Jewish-Russian immigrant songwriter, Irving Berlin, not only played a huge role in the invention the Broadway Musical, but also invented an entirely new category of popular song – the Christmas standard. This episode is an audio …

This is the first of three episodes highlighting the principal themes of the Broadway Musical. Today I look at the single most ubiquitous and pervasive theme: “Transgressive Women”. From “Laurey” in Oklahoma! to “Elphaba” in Wicked. From “Annie Oakley” to “Tracy Turnblad”. From “Maria” in The S…

Perhaps surprisingly, the current generation of Broadway creators has re-embraced and reinvigorated both the “Musical Comedy” and the “Musical Play” in ways that I think would make Rodgers & Hammerstein very proud, with shows such as Hairspray and Wicked, At the same time they have introduced some…

The second half of my interview with NY Post columnist Michael Riedel about his new book, Singular Sensation – The Triumph of Broadway continues the story of the Broadway Musical in the 1990s including the musicals CHICAGO, The Full Monty, The Producers, and The Lion King.

In this episode I interview NY Post columnist Michael Riedel about his new book, "Singular Sensation - The Triumph Of Broadway", and that conversation is the perfect vehicle to continue to tell the story of the Broadway Musical during the final decade of the 20th Century.

The Modern Era of Broadway, part 7. In this episode I explore what is often called “The British Invasion of Broadway” – a ten-year period during which it seemed that writers, directors, designers, producers and performers from the UK had sailed in and taken over Broadway with musicals such as Les…

In this episode I explore the growing visibility of queer stories, themes and characters on Broadway in musicals such as Hair, Coco, Applause, Seesaw, A Chorus Line, and La Cage Aux Folles, as well as the devastating effect that the AIDS Crisis had on Broadway during the 1980s and 90s when a whole…

In this episode I explore the history of what is called the “Concept Musical”, including its key creators: Harold Prince, Stephen Sondheim, Kander & Ebb, Michael Bennett and their game changing musicals Cabaret, Company, Follies, A Chorus Line, Chicago, Cats, and Dreamgirls.

In this episode I celebrate 1970s Broadway, and the return of the Black Musical. More than a dozen hit black musicals opened during the decade, and three of them won the TONY Award for "Best Musical"! About half of them were dynamic new, original musical plays – mostly adaptations of popular play…

In this episode I continue my review of Broadway’s Nostalgia Craze of the 1970s and beyond. This includes the musicals Grease, Irene, Over Here!, Very Good Eddie, Whoopee!, Sugar Babies, 42nd Street A Day In Hollywood A Night In The Ukraine, On Your Toes, My One And Only, Crazy For You, Me And My …