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“Aren’t you going to say anything about the decision to drop ‘I Feel Pretty’ from the upcoming Broadway revival of WEST SIDE STORY?!” Since the announcement on Nov. 15 that director Ivo van Hove and/or lyricist Stephen Sondheim decided to drop one of the most famous songs from the landmark score, not a day goes by […]

Don’t you just love when a Broadway lyricist thinks of A Great Idea for a Song? We’re not just talking about clever “squabble-Bob’ll”-type rhymes but an idea for a song that wouldn’t occur to a run-of-the-mill lyricist. My nominees for Greatest Song Idea of the Decade? In the forties, E.Y. Harburg for “When I’m Not […]

The concert version of OVER HERE! last month in New York spurred Lynda Wells to give me a call. She was Maxene Andrews’ daughter and longtime lover. Did that sentence grab your attention? Wells was Andrews’ lover first and foremost starting in 1973, around the time when plans were afoot to bring OVER HERE! to […]

We know the word “de-lovely” from a Cole Porter song and the title of a 2004 biopic of the legendary composer-lyricist. In case you’ve ever wondered how it originated, THE LETTERS OF COLE PORTER will inform you. In a missive to Variety editor Abel Green on May 25, 1945, Porter wrote of the time he, […]

Those who have lived with parents — and have had grandparents visit them – were quick to learn one fact of life. Grandparents love you in a way that your parents can’t, don’t or won’t. We see that once again in BEAU, a new funk-folk bluegrass musical that isn’t blue in either mood or language. […]