Broadway Blogs - Starry GUYS & DOLLS at the Bowl and More...

If you loved last summer's LES MISERABLES concerts at the Bowl (or if you missed them), you'll not want to miss this year's brilliantly cast GUYS & DOLLS. 

I can't wait to see Ellen Greene and the rest of the cast (Jessica Biel, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Scott Bakula, Ken Page, etc). take on these iconic roles and we'll be there every step of the way with the same great access that the Hollywood Bowl gave us last year to cover it on BroadwayWorld.TV. 

Can't wait! 

Broadway's all over TV these days, resulting in us Stage Tubing clips more often than ever to help visitors not miss ANYTHING. We've got Nathan Lane on Letterman sharing his surprise cameo in the upcoming STAR TREK film and Regis giving a preview of what he looks like dressed as SHREK. 

Both are hilarious, and speaking of Regis, next week (April 27 - May 1) is Broadway Week on Live with Regis and Kelly and the pair will be visiting Mary Poppins, Billy Elliot, Rock of Ages, West Side Story and Shrek. If that wasn't enough, the hosts are getting into the act as well, and you'll be able to see Kelly donning the Mary Poppins costume and flying on stage, dancing with the cast of West Side Story and Regis performing with the cast of Rock of Ages and being transformed into the lovable Shrek. Sounds DVR-worthy to me!

What, no Next to Normal where each shows what medication they're on? Maybe next time...

A trio of comedies set over one weekend at a home in the English countryside. Each play takes place in a different locations around the house: the dining room in Table Manners, the living room in Living Together, and the garden in Round and Round the Garden. The ingenious result is that as plots unfold, something seemingly incidental in one play takes on a hysterical new context in the next.

Table Manners; the events of the weekend as seen from the dining room. In which Reg finds food scarce despite having it thrown at him by Sarah…Sarah is scandalized by Annie…Annie is disappointed by men in general and Tom in particular…Tom knocks down Norman…Norman’s romantic proposals are ruined thanks to Ruth…Ruth loses her patience, her temper and her glasses…and in which everyone has trouble deciding where to sit.

Living Together: the events of the weekend as seen from the sitting room. In which Reg is driven mad by Tom…Tom tells Annie a thing or two…Annie nearly comes to blows with Sarah…Sarah sees a different side of Norman…Norman sorts things out with Ruth…Ruth discovers the charms of a fireside rug…and in which nobody enjoys playing board games.

Round and Round the Garden: the events of the weekend as seen from the garden. In which Ruth thoroughly confuses Tom…Tom succeeds in asking Annie…Annie gets a glimpse of Norman’s pajamas…Norman tells Sarah stories by moonlight…Sarah disapproves of Reg’s outdoor sports…and in which everyone gets to roll in the grass.

David Rooney, Variety: "Woody Allen in his prime was a great proponent of the theory that comedies should do the job in 90 minutes. Thankfully, Alan Ayckbourn must have missed that memo. Over seven hours of hilarious peaks and contemplative valleys, his 1973 trilogy "The Norman Conquests" delivers more laughs than ought to be legal while steadily expanding our perspective on the needling dissatisfaction beneath the comic chaos of his characters' lives. There's no such lack of audience fulfillment in the richly rewarding revival transferring from London's Old Vic, its structural ingenuity matched by an exceptional cast and by the supple modulations of Matthew Warchus' direction."

Michael Kuchwara, Associated Press: "Ayckbourn's plays, first seen on Broadway in 1975, are as rueful as they are riotous, a rare combination that has been fully realized here. Their titles _ "Table Manners," "Living Together" and "Round and Round the Garden" _ make them sound as if they are stock sitcoms. They're not."

Ben Brantley, New York Times: "I know the question you want to ask. If you see only one of these plays, which should it be? Let me put it this way: You can't lose with any one, but you win big if you go to all three. Seeing the entire trilogy in one day, as I did, allowed me the luxurious privilege of getting to know characters in a way that only fat novels allow. I wouldn't have sacrificed one "oh," "aah" or pause of those seven hours."

Melissa Rose Bernardo, Entertainment Weekly: "To see or not to see the entire trilogy...that is the question. You won't offend Alan Ayckbourn if you don't see every part (Table Manners, Living Together, and Round and Round the Garden); he constructed each 1973 comedy as a stand-alone evening: 'Any suggestion that it was essential to see all three plays to appreciate any one of them would probably result in no audience at all,' he says in the preface to Conquests' published edition. Will you want to see all of them? Given this smashing revival imported from London's Kevin Spacey-run Old Vic Theatre, the answer is an unqualified yes."

Erik Haagensen, Backstage: "It's proving to be a stellar year for revivals on the Great White Way, but none packs as much comic punch as the Old Vic Theatre Company's splendid production of Alan Ayckbourn's The Norman Conquests. Rarely have I heard such explosive laughter rock a theatre with such regularity."

Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter: "Bottom Line: Brilliantly staged trilogy of hilarious British comedies seems poised to conquer Broadway."

Terry Teachout, The Wall Street Journal: "Alan Ayckbourn writes funny plays about sad people. It's an unsettling combination, which may explain why England's most popular and prolific playwright isn't as well known in this country as he ought to be -- but if anything can put Mr. Ayckbourn at the center of our theatrical map, it'll be the Old Vic's razor-sharp revival of "The Norman Conquests," which has come to Broadway after a triumphant London run. This 1973 triptych of plays about the travails of a suburban family is one of the 20th century's comic masterpieces, and the Old Vic's production is as good a staging as you're likely to see in your lifetime."

John Simon, Bloomberg News: "Alan Ayckbourn's "The Norman Conquests," revived in London by Kevin Spacey's Old Vic Company and now exported to Broadway, is a remarkable invention. Three full-length comedies view the same extended-family July weekend in adjacent locales, providing titillating revelations as funny as they are serious. They may be seen in any order, and if you don't have time for all three, each stands perfectly well on its own."

More to come in the AM!