We talk to Three Time Tony Award Winning Producer Dori Berinstein about the new documentary "ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway." She also talks about her new production "Legally Blonde" and the changing role of the Broadway producer.
"ShowBusiness" follows the 2003-2004 Broadway season and looks at the path that shows such as "Wicked," "Avenue Q," and "Caroline or Change" took to Broadway. "ShowBusiness" is being released in New York on May 11th with a platform release across the country after that. For more info and a release date schedule click here .
Dori Berinstein won a Tony Award for her producing efforts on "Thoroughly Modern Millie," "Fool Moon," and "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest." Her current show "Legally Blonde" is playing at the Palace Theatre. For tickets and more info click here.
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Broadway Bullet Interview: Dori Berinstein of ShowBusiness
BROADWAY BULLET: Every fan of the show definitely knows the trials and tribulations that go into producing theater, whether it's at a Broadway level or at their community theater. But there hasn't been a film that's quite captured the franticness of an entire season before, but just now we have the documentary "Show Business" directed by Dori Berinstein. And Dori's here to talk about that in the studio; how are you doing?
DORI BERINSTEIN: Excellent, thanks for having me.
BB: I'm glad to have you here. Anyone who has three Tony's lined up on their wall is welcome to come on by.
DORI: Thank you.
BB: So I imagine those three Tony's had a little bit to do with you getting access to do this amazing documentary.
DORI: I think it did help in a number of ways to be a Broadway insider. I did know a lot of people in the community, and so it helped with access. But also, I think for me, it helped being part of the community for fifteen years before I made the movie, I knew what I wanted to make. I knew the story I wanted to tell, and I knew the community well enough and the process of creating theater, so I felt that I could be responsible with this incredibly precious subject matter.
BB: Now the movie follows, predominately, four of the main musicals of the 2003-2004 season, especially the Wicked, Avenue Q showdown. Now you did like 250 hours of footage over the season?
DORI: A little more than that, yes.
BB: How? I mean, that seems incredibly daunting. Did you have people just constantly going out? How are you keeping track of the footage? What was all the process going into this?
DORI: Well, I had a very small team, but a very dedicated team. And you know, when you're set out to capture a Broadway season, you don't know what's going to happen. You don't know if the big shows they're talking about coming in are really going to come it; and then of course there are little shows that come in and take Broadway by storm and no one even predicted, Avenue Q for example. And so we really had to be there throughout the entire season, and capture everything that was going on because we didn't know at the end of the day in the editing room what configuration, what stories we wanted to tell to make the strongest film. So we had to be everywhere.
