J.B. Spins

We all know what you’re wondering: yes, there is a shirtless sax player. However, he serves more as a comedic reference to Joel Schumacher’s...

The prospect of a European nation waging war against Turkey on the island of Cypress ought to be unthinkable in the near future. Yet, given ...

There was a time when Broadway was the place for horror. It was a very different Broadway, when the masses could find an afternoon’s enterta...

The international airport at Gander, Newfoundland used to be the great last-chance-for-gas station in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Howe...

Don’t call the Ellington Orchestra a ghost band.  At least it wasn’t in the early 1980’s.  The maestro would still recognize most of the ...

If you believe the W.C. Fields theory of kids and animals, Daddy Warbucks must be a terrible part.  Plus, there’s the whole baldness thin...

They are not booing, they are chanting “Drood.”  Spectators are immediately asked to join in and hold that “o” whenever the title charac...

Celebrity casting might sell tickets initially, but their commitment to a production is usually limited. However, if a show hires Broadway a...

It was still tough, but New York offered comparatively more opportunities during the Great Depression (as opposed to the current lousy one),...

The lily white Huey Calhoun has his faults, but he is not trying to appropriate the music of Memphis’s rhythm & blues musicians. While p...

It seemed like there was a revolutionary spirit afoot on Broadway in early 2008, when two new musicals brought the theater world an infusion...

Even those who have never seen the Broadway musical A Chorus Line are likely to be familiar with many of the show’s songs, including “What ...

Welcome to Upper Manhattan—some might call it the barrio. Broadway has not gotten up around here too often since West Side Story . However, ...

The image of a journeyman musician carrying a guitar down that lonesome road still has resonance in our collective unconscious. That archety...

Stephen Sondheim has a reputation as Broadway’s most challenging composer, but his work has proved remarkably accessible and pliant in recen...

For many of us, 1968 means only one thing: Soviet tanks rolling through the streets of Prague. Rock ‘n’ Roll , Tom Stoppard’s latest play, i...

The illegal transit strike of 2005 did not quite go according to the transit union’s plans. Deep, dark blue New York City quickly lost pati...

Broadway lyricists are in a bit of a slump. It has been years since they produced a breakout hit. As entertaining a show as The Drowsy Cha...

Stop your Sopranos griping. It’s over. As disappointing as it may have been, Sunday could have been worse, if say, you were producing the ...

The modern musical and jazz have common roots in the Broadway revues of turn-of-the-century musicians like James Reese Europe and Joe Jordan...