The Fall Season

After a calm few weeks, the fall season is suddenly upon us with a vengeance. Kicking it off this week, of course, is the fabulous Lynda Carter. She starts a 5 night stand at the Apollo on Wednesday (I'll be there Saturday). How appropriate that last night's Will & Grace on WGN was the final season's Christmas episode in which Will claims to know that his nephew is gay not because he was Wonder Woman for Halloween but because he was Lynda Carter. Anyways, look for my review a week from now.

Also getting the season off to a start is the Marriott's production of The Producers, the first regional production after its close on Broadway earlier this year. Now you know I'm not a fan of the show, I thought the movie (the original Gene Wilder movie that the musical is based on, not the 2005 movie of the musical) was more stupid than funny and I'm really over the transformation of movies into Broadway shows, at least when they're done cynically like Producers, The Wedding Singer, Legally Blonde, ad nauseum, to make a quick buck. However, my companion wants to see it, so see it I will and of course you'll be the first to know my thoughts.

Starting later this month is a regional (I'm assuming it's the first since it's still playing in New York and touring) production of Altar Boyz at the Drury Lane Water Tower. No final announcement yet on casting, although its starting on the 28th (with an official opening on Oct. 3), so I'm not expecting any top names, but it's a great show and should be a good space for it. I should also be seeing that one sooner rather than later since my sister in law wants to go, although she did bail on DRS on us leaving us with an $80 empty seat, but hopefully we can get a good group together for a fun Sunday afternoon before the weather gets too nasty.

Also off to a quick, if too brief, start is Porchlight with their 6 week production of Maury Yeston's Phantom (Yeston apparently being the theme of the season as spring's production will be Nine, just in time for the movie). It could benefit by beating ALW's Phantom to the punch and drawing in audiences willing to experience something different, or it could bomb because its preceding ALW's Phantom and audiences will want to wait for the more well known show. However, Maury's Phantom does have a strong history in Chicago having run for years at the now-closed Candelight Dinner Theatre, and sophisticated audiences should know and be able to appreciate the difference. I know I do.

My most anticipated fall offering is American Theatre Company's upcoming production of I do, I do, which they are billing as a "World Premiere" because they got permission from Jones & Schmidt to reset it in Chicago and update the storyline. That's a bit of a cheat if you ask me, but it's a rarely done show with a great pedigree and I'm thrilled to have the chance to see it done by a quality company.

As I mentioned a couple months ago, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre is doing Passion starring Ana Gasteyer as Fosca. At the time I had said I'd be first in line, but with everything else going on this fall (besides these shows, the opera season is starting and I've got my trip to Europe and Billy Elliot coming up which not only knocks out the 2 weeks I'm gone, but I can't stay awake past 6:00 pm for about 3 weeks after getting back, which makes it impossible to go to an evening show. Too bad no one does shows at 3 in the morning when I'm awake and vowing never to go on an extended trip 8 time zones ahead ever again). However, other than Altar Boyz, it's the one show that I've seen before (Ravinia's terrific staging with Patti and Audra in 2003), so unfortunately, as much as I would love to support it and hope for further revivals of obscure shows, it may be the one I end up dropping.

Lastly, the House Theatre is reviving The Sparrow, which I had wanted to see earlier this year and didn't get around to, so hopefully I'll be doing that one for sure this time. They're doing it at the Apollo, which seems to be doing great business hosting extended runs of hit shows that would otherwise have to close, and it's running at least through the end of the year, so after I see some of these in the next couple of months, go to Europe, get my internal clock readjusted, I can go see it in December and be a little more relaxed about it.

Of course, the other big event to close out the year is the release of Sweeney Todd. Supposedly the advance word from the studio is good, but I'm still worried it's going to turn out more like The Nightmare of the Meat Pies and less like John Carpenter's (the director I would have liked to see helm it) Halloween, the movie Sondheim/Prince was most obviously influenced by when first creating it in 1978. The casting of Borat as Pirelli does not reassure me that Tim Burton is going to cut down his traditional cartoonishness and ramp up the sincerity. We'll just have to see.

Besides shows, the fall season is offering some good CD's. Of course there will be the Sweeney soundtrack, but before that the Grease CD is going to be released on October 2. Of course I'm not thrilled about the score itself, but it'll be great to have Max and Laura on record. The Xanadu cast recording will hopefully be released before the end of the year, although there's no official word. It will be interesting to see which leading man, Cheyenne or James, gets to record it. It should also make for an interesting Tony race next spring. Betty Buckley is finally seeing her long-delayed debut album from 1962 get released in October with a new album in February. Lastly, while I was browsing emusic, using up my download credits, I discovered that at long last, a recording of the 1992 musical Anna Karenina has finally been released. The show itself got overshadowed by Kiss of the Spider Woman and Tommy, and after bombing out at the Tony's (along with Blood Brothers), it quickly disappeared with only double digit performances. However, while the other three Best Musical nominees (even Blood Brothers) got cast albums, and KOTSW even got two, the producers of Anna K decided to cut their losses and closed the show before the cast got to the recording studio. So, this CD is not technically a cast recording, and not even a years-delayed cast reunion like Nick & Nora or Grand Hotel in which all the major players finally get to the studio years after the show closed to give us as close a true reproduction of the show as possible, but rather is an all-star recording of a slightly revised score, presumably in an attempt to entice regional producers or to lay the groundwork for an eventual Broadway revival. Still, if Anna Karenina can finally be heard by the masses, there's hope for Carrie yet. I used up my monthly downloads on The Boys From Syracuse, but they refresh a week from Thursday and you can bet I'll be firing up the computer as soon as I get home and getting this one, then starting on Ben Franklin in Paris with whatever I have left over.