Profile for zbigner

The Sunday Houston Chronicle has an extensive article about the Alley resident company, and it reminded me of this thread. To the right of the article you can find audio interviews with the company members as well. I found it quite interesting.

I really enjoyed it. It's a good example of how the Alley works. About half the roles were filled with Company members, and the others were outside actors. Gregory Boyd's direction was spot on, and it worked very well in the smaller space. I knew what to expect going in having read about the show in the newspaper and having seen The Pillowman last year. Apparently, some folks were unprepared, and there were some walkouts. Another interesting thing related to the Daisey article is that while L...

Interesting article. I had never really thought about the connection between "outsourcing" acting jobs and increasing the role and expense of arts administrators. The Alley Theatre here in Houston is one of the few major regional theatres that still maintains a resident company of actors. As a subscriber I really enjoy seeing the same actors year after year tackling different types and sizes of roles. I have heard several of the actors say that they really like this as well. I also subscribe ...

I saw the Alley production, and I can't imagine that version going to Broadway or anywhere else. The acting and sets were quite good, but the play itself was just plain boring. Ludwig has talent, but it didn't show in this work. Some serious retooling is needed for this show to succeed.

The Alley Theatre in Houston is doing a production in the next month or two. If you email them, they might be able to point you in the right direction.

For a variety of reasons I have decided to shut down Maximum Broadway Radio at the end of December. When I started the station 4 years ago, I never imagined the incredible response it would eventually generate, and I appreciate all of you who have been listeners over the years. To celebrate the great years I have had, the station will have special programming throughout the month. The main playlist will feature a few hundred of my favorite tracks from the nearly 4000 in the station library. I...

If you studied with the teacher, it might be nice to sing something you learned with him/her that has meaning for you. Alternatively, you might sing something that exemplifies why the teacher was so beloved. For example, if he/she was known for exposing students to new ideas, "Open a New Window" from Mame might be appropriate.

Musical Theatre on over the air radio is virtually impossible to find. WERS in Boston has a great show on Saturday and Sunday mornings for about 4 hours. It's streamed online as well. There are a couple of syndicated shows that you might stumble upon, but they are not widely distributed. Motorala has been working on a system called iRadio to bring internet radio to cars, but the project seems to have stalled. I had hoped Maximum Broadway Radio would be available on the service, but it doesn't...

Back in May/June either Sundance Channel of IFC was running a documentary called The Human Behavior Experiments. The filmakers deal with the Genovese case along with some of the research related to it. It is a quite interesting film. I don't know if it's still running or available on DVD.

It's been a long time since I saw it, so I may be off-base, but the first show that came to my mind was Dreamgirls. Maybe it's just on my mind because of the movie.

In major markets around the country, radio stations are adding second channels for people with HD radios. Many public radio stations that have eliminated or reduced their classical music broadcasts will be using these 2nd channels to bring back the classical music they used to play. You may want to check with your local public radio station to see what their plans are and put in a request that they carve out at least a little time for show tunes. Remember they are member driven. Clear Channel...

I saw it. I'm not much for opera, but I enjoyed it. Audra is incredible, and the piece seemed quite challenging even for her. Not surprisingly, there weren't exactly any humable tunes. I'm not sure I would want to listen to a CD of it. I think it would lose a lot not having the live performance. Zack

If you saw Jason Alexander's apperance on Evening at Pops a few years back, I'm pretty sure Sklar was his music director. They even did a duet of "You're Nothing without Me".

I'll 2nd A Class Act. I saw it done in a 100 seat theatre with virtually no set, props, or costumes, and it was brilliant because the actors could pull off playing the multiple roles as needed. If you've got enough older actors, 70, Girls, 70 could be done fairly simply as well. I haven't seen a production, so I don't know the requirements, but I think A Man of No Importance is one of the best scores of the last decade. I would certainly give it a look. Zack

XM is hooked up with Directv and Sirius is hooked up with Dish. We have Directv, and the Broadway channel is not available on our package. There are certain channels that require a higher subscription level. XM does put its music channels online, but they aren't free. I don't know if you can do an online-only subscription or not. If you have one of their radios, you get the online part automatically as part of your regular subscription. I'll admit up front that I am biased, but I find the mix...

My advance copy of the CD came a couple of days ago. I encoded the tracks today, so they should start running on the station tomorrow or Monday. I'm quite impressed with the recording. I've only read about the show, but I think the CD does a good job capturing its spirit. Zack Maximum Broadway Radio

Broadway is fundamentally different than the movies, television, and music in that it is distributed to a few thousand people at a time. As long as people have to go to the theater to see the shows, the Tonys will have low ratings. Millions of people watch the other awards because they actually know somethign about most of the movies, shows, and performers and in most cases have actually seen the nominated work. The internet has made it a little easier for folks who aren't in New York to be i...

I don't know how I missed this thread last week, but I managed to somehow. I'm glad to hear nice comments about the station. The story behind why I don't take online requests anymore is somewhat complicated, but the alternative was to end up with people getting locked out of the station. I didn't want that to happen, so I had to switch to a different hosting package. I don't want to do tech support for MBR on BWW's bandwidth, but feel free to email me at radio@maximumbroadway.com if you are h...

The Alley Theatre in Houston just announced Hitchcock Blonde as part of their 06-07 season. That makes me think it's not headed for Broadway. They typically don't allow regional productions before a Broadway run unless they are out-of-town tryouts. I didn't get the impression that the Alley production was filling that role. It's also possible that the Alley has the rights contingent on no Broadway production and that they will have to fill that slot with something else. Zack

How about discussing why the arts are critical to society and, thus, deserve government support. Many people would argue that something should not be financed by taxpayers just because there aren't enough people willing to pay for it on their own. Others would argue that the taxpayers finance many things that are deemed important to society (e.g. public transportation). You might extend this idea to talk about the importance of keeping quality arts programs in schools. Zack