Tony Awards 1990

[Keiichi2]

Posted: 10/17/24 at 7:10pm

I'm going on a short theater trip in less than two weeks. (I'm seeing Tammy Faye, Oh Mary!, Once Upon a Mattress and Sunset Boulevard while I am there.) One of my traditions is that during the two weeks leading up to a theater trip, I listen to Tony Award broadcasts, musicals and movies about NY while I work just to help me get in the mood.

 

I was listening to the 1990 Tony Awards this morning, and I honestly have to wonder why haven't the two big musicals of that season (Grand Hotel and City of Angels) not been revived since?  I know it's hard to tell from just the snippets they play during the awards, but both look like productions I would adore to see grand revivals of, and it's kind of hard to believe they have never been revived.  I was too young to travel and enjoy these shows at the time (I turned 13 the summer these Awards aired.), and I wish I could get a chance to see these revived.

 

Also, with the recent passing of Maggie Smith, I would have loved to have seen her back then in Lettice and Lovage based on the scene that was performed.  Shame she never returned to Broadway after that.

[Broadway61004]

Posted: 10/17/24 at 7:57pm

City of Angels is one of those shows that the original staging was so brilliant, a lot of directors and designers have been hesitant to even try to rethink it and therefore it's been a bit lost to history.

Grand Hotel was sort of the opposite where it's a pretty mediocre script who's production was supposed to be, well, grand, but was ultimately kind of poorly received. So it kind of just became an afterthought in the late 80s/early 90s musical theatre canon.

But I agree it would be great to see them revived again.

[inception]

Posted: 10/17/24 at 8:07pm

Om November 14, 15, & 16 at 54 Below there will be three performances billed as "Grand Hotel: The 35th Anniversary Original Broadway Cast Reunion Concert."

[Menken Fan]

Posted: 10/17/24 at 9:00pm

I love Grand Hotel (and have appeared in a local production). They presented it at Encores a few years back, and it was spectacular.  I was really, really hoping it would transfer to Broadway.  

[ChairinMain]

Posted: 10/17/24 at 9:05pm

Tommy Tune very much rescued Grand Hotel from disaster (the production was itself a remount of a show that had tried and failed to make it to Broadway in 1958), and his production was the critical hit of the season. It ran for three years and I believe turned a profit. And it indeed boasts one of the greatest Tony performances of all time. But yes, it’s languished a bit, Iand I don’t know that we’ll see a revival anytime soon. There was a well received Encores production in 2018 but talk of a transfer didn’t materialize. 
 

City of Angels is one of my very favorite shows. It’s brilliant, funny and unmistakably theatrical. I too would welcome a revival of either…I also think City of Angels would be great movie musical material.