Broadway Legend Joined: 11/23/05
"I love watching out for theatre stuff. I love how pictures of Times Square try not to include any theatre billboards because they can date a picture so easily. I love how you can pinpoint the dates of filming of 'Enchanted' to within a few weeks because of the billboards that are up at the time. I love trying to work out when a picture of Times Square was taken by whatever theatre things I can spy."
I love doing that too. When I saw Borat, I was like, "Oh, look a Dirty Rotten Scoundrels sign!"
Also, in Author! Author!, I believe you can see the marquee for Nicholas Nickleby in the background.
"There was some Glenn Close movie that kicked The Producers out of the St. James for the day, but I don't recall what. "
The above was the film "Heights" which is based on a play.
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/04
I don't know which theatre it was, but in Jersey Girl, Ben Affleck's character takes his daughter to see Sweeney in NY. I remember though there was a shot of one of the original billboards for Producers in it though.
I love when films are shot in NY and they shoot in Times Square cause you get an idea of what year the movie was film in some cases. Like in The Pink Panther, there's a shot of Steve Martin standing in Times Square and right behind him is a billboard for Little Shop of Horrors(odd though seeing that he was Orin in the movie). The movie came out in 2006, but I'm guessing it was filmed in early 2004(it was before Fatone took over). There's a Jersey Boys billboard in Spiderman 3.
I was trying to figure out which theatre Ben Affleck's character took his daughter to see Sweeeny Todd in that god awful movie Jersey Girl. But, Kevin Smith made his Cats hatred quite clear. When the daughter of Affleck's character was asking if Cats is in the bible Affleck quickly replied yes in the satanic bible.
I'm sure at least 75% of the time Hollywood makes a show with a theater in it, they shoot in a Broadway Theater.
That is the theaters on Broadway Ave. in downtown Los Angeles.
I can't count the number of times The Los Angeles, The Million Dollar, The United Artists, The Orpheum, etc. have subber for Broadway, New York.
I love this thread and am bumping it in case anyone has new ones to share.
Belasco was in Bullets Over Broadway
Only the exterior of the Belasco was used for Bullets Over Broadway. The interiors are the Cort masquerading as the Belasco - you can tell because they show the Cort's fairly distinctive proscenium.
The Palace is featured in the original Fame.
The Palace is also, of course, in All That Jazz!
Featured Actor Joined: 10/13/06
In the original Fame we can see the billboard for Evita. Alan Parker later directed the film version of Evita as well.
In Benjiman Button, the theatre is labled the Majestic on the outside but I am not sure which theatre it really is on the inside.
If you watch Cash Cab, you can sometimes see random theatres or Broadway posters in the backround.
In The Basketball Diaries, there is a scene where Leo DiCaprio and Juliette Lewis are standing in Times Square near where the TKTS booth is now, right in front of the Palace.
There's an episode of Will&Grace where Grace (and Leo or Will?) go to see Suessical at the Music Box Theater. The exterior of the Music Box is filmed, but the inside lobby (filmed in LA) is clearly not the Music Box.
In one of the final episodes of I Love Lucy, they go to see The Most Happy Fella, which was at the Imperial, and they do make mention of that. They show them in the box office, which itself did kind of look similar to the real one. I can't remember if they show the exterior though.
EVERY Woody Allen movie has a bunch of marquees in it... they are veritable archives on the streets many theatres are on from the 70s to now.
BROADWAY DANNY ROSE and MANHATTAN literally have almost everything... probably all the marquees of the shows running at that time.
HUSBANDS & WIVES also has tons of theatre marquees.
And in MATCH POINT, not set in NY of course, they see THE WOMAN IN WHITE at the Palace(?).
P
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/30/09
KInd of off topic, but I just realized after reading the title of the thread that the Ugly Betty episode was not filmed at the Gershwin, and reading the thread confirmed the suspicion. Anyway, the one thing that annoyed me during the episode was that Betty and Henry kept texting and leaving the theater during the show. If I was an usher, I'd kick them out.
the nederlander was used in Hamlet 2
The Playhouse and Playwrights Horizons are visible at the end of Tootsie. I love it.
"KInd of off topic, but I just realized after reading the title of the thread that the Ugly Betty episode was not filmed at the Gershwin, and reading the thread confirmed the suspicion."
Ummmm, it was the original LA cast when the show was being filmed in LA......
That cast had also been on Broadway... Megan and Eden (who are in the Ugly Betty episode) were the 5th pairing on Broadway, coming after Idina and Kristin, Idina and JLT, Shoshana and JLT, and Shoshana and Megan. The cast alone wouldn't shouldn't have told you whether or not it was Broadway or not. The theatre, however, is the dead giveaway.
"In the original Fame we can see the billboard for Evita."
That reminds me, a bus advertising EVITA was destroyed in SUPERMAN II (1980).
Technically Off-Broadway, but the Douglas Fairbanks Theatre was used at the beginning of DEATH BECOMES HER when Madeline performs "Me" in SONGBIRD (a musicalized version of SWEET BIRD OF YOUTH).
"That cast had also been on Broadway... Megan and Eden (who are in the Ugly Betty episode) were the 5th pairing on Broadway, coming after Idina and Kristin, Idina and JLT, Shoshana and JLT, and Shoshana and Megan. The cast alone wouldn't shouldn't have told you whether or not it was Broadway or not. The theatre, however, is the dead giveaway. "
The theatre and the fact that Kristoffer Cusick was Fiyero...
Dang you bandit964! I was going to say that. Hamlet 2, Nederlander.
Re: the previous message,
Heh yeah. When the characters were walking past those exterior walls, the old Rent graffiti was very noticeable. Before they even panned up to show the marquee I thought, "Awesome! They're at the Nederlander."
"The theatre and the fact that Kristoffer Cusick was Fiyero..."
Kristoffer Cusick...who is on stage/screen for literally 5 seconds and whose face you can't even see? That could have been anyone. The only way someone could have been able to tell that was Kristoffer was from seeing him perform and recognizing his voice. Anyone who hadn't seen him in the role would have assumed it to be just some random Fiyero.
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