BWW Exclusive: Counting Down to Jennifer Ashley Tepper's THE UNTOLD STORIES OF BROADWAY, VOLUME 2 - The Palace Theatre

To celebrate the publication of The Untold Stories of Broadway, Volume 2 on November 18 by Dress Circle Publishing, Jennifer Ashley Tepper will be sharing three short excerpts about each of the Broadway theaters featured in the book-countdown style! Today: The Palace Theatre!

The second book in a multivolume collection examines eight Broadway theaters and over 70 years of theatrical history through the voices of such Broadway greats as Jason Robert Brown, Joanna Gleason, Jonathan Groff,Jeremy Jordan, Laura Linney, Joe Mantello, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Robert Morse, Harold Prince, Charles Strouse, Alex Timbers, Julie Taymor, Robert Wankel, George C. Wolfe and more. The eight Broadway theaters featured in the second book are the Palace Theatre, the Barrymore Theatre, the Gershwin Theatre, the Circle in the Square, the Shubert Theatre, the Criterion Center Stage Right, the Vivian Beaumont Theatre and the Nederlander Theatre.

Have you ever wanted to sneak behind the curtain of some of Broadway's greatest hits, including Wicked, Rent, and A Chorus Line? Do you wonder what secret Tom Bosley told Robert Morse about Sardi's or what Patti LuPone revealed to Raúl Esparza about Broadway dressing rooms? Are you dying to know what Laura Linney learned as a young understudy, watching Stockard Channing on stage each night?

From opening nights to closing nights. From secret passageways to ghostly encounters. From Broadway debuts to landmark productions. Score a front row seat to hear hundreds of stories about the most important stages in the world, seen through the eyes of the producers, actors, stage hands, writers, musicians, company managers, dressers, designers, directors, ushers, and door men who bring The Great White Way to life each night. You'll never look at Broadway the same way again. The Untold Stories of Broadway, Volume 2 is the second book in a multi-volume series that will tell the stories of all of the Broadway houses.

The Palace Theatre

Did You Know:

Aaron Sorkin used to bartend at the Palace?

In the mid-1980s, Aaron Sorkin was a bartender at the Palace Theatre. Originally an actor, he was also a runner for the TKTS booth before he sat down at a typewriter. Much of A Few Good Men was originally scribbled on cocktail napkins at the Palace Theatre bar during act one of La Cage aux Folles. Within a few years, the bartender turned Broadway playwright when A Few Good Men opened a few blocks south at the Music Box.

When actor Peter Krause auditioned for Sorkin's Sports Night, Krause reminded him that they worked together at the bar at the Palace. Sorkin was the bar manager at that point and Krause was a bartender.

Did You Know:

Two Fosse Flops Can Lead To A Fosse Hit?

John McMartin, Actor

Bob Fosse and I did a musical together called The Conquering Hero, which was short-lived on Broadway. Then, we did a musical called Pleasures and Palaces, with music by the great Frank Loesser. That one never got out of Detroit.

One night, after a performance of Pleasures and Palaces, Bob and I were at a bar together. We knew we were closing and we weren't going to New York, and Bob said, "I want to do something else together." I said, "Oh, wow." And he said, "What's the matter?"

I said, "I've been in two bombs with you now-I thought you wouldn't want to work with me again," and he said, "Well, I was thinking maybe you thought that about me!"

A little while later, we ran into each other on the street in New York. Bob said, "That show I told you about, I'll send you part of the script." It was the elevator scene from Sweet Charity. He said, "I don't know if you'll have a number or anything," and I said, "I don't care if all I have to do is just this elevator scene." Neil Simon wrote it, and it was top-drawer comedy.

We went into the Palace. The Palace was iconic to me, because when I was a kid I would listen on the radio to comics always saying, "Oh, I played the Palace!" It was the pinnacle for them, because it was a top vaudeville house. And I thought: I get to play the Palace!

It had just been changed to a legit house, and we were the first play to go in there, so I felt I was entering into theatre history. I was, too, because Sweet Charity was a success and a joyous one for me and the company. We all had a great time. I did the movie because of its success, all thanks to Bob Fosse.

Did You Know:

President Richard M. Nixon Loved Seeing Shows At The Palace?

Richard M. Nixon, President-elect at the time, attended George M! and was greeted with a standing ovation. He sat in the 5th row with his wife, daughters, and several friends, and went backstage afterward to congratulate Joel Grey and the cast and to accept a vintage George M. Cohan recording from the cast. Nixon commented that he missed going to the theater several times a week, as he and his wife would do right after World War II when they were living in New York. He told the George M! cast, "We used to sit in the balcony then, but we enjoyed the shows just as much."

Did You Know:

There Weren't As Many Women In The Orchestra Pit Back In The Day?

Red Press, Musical Coordinator

When I started doing theatre, there were very few women in the pit, except for the occasional harpist. When I hired some women to play Lorelei, a man who was one of my house musicians said to me, "How dare you hire a woman! There is a man sitting at home trying to support a family who is unemployed!" I will never forget that. Things were different.

But in that show, I decided to hire women in the pit. As always, the men would bring in magazines of naked women to read when they weren't playing, and the women became aware of it. So the women went out and got a picture of a naked man and they hung it up in their section of the pit. My conductor came in and saw it and gasped, "Who put that picture there?! How dare they! There are women in this orchestra!"

The Untold Stories of Broadway, Volume 2 can be pre-ordered by visiting Dress Circle Publishing and will officially release on November 18, 2014. For more information please visit www.dresscirclepublishing.com.

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