Broadway News Round Up 20

Adam Jacobs as Aladdin, Photo by Deen Van Meer

Starting this week's update with some incredible news.  Aladdin has once again broken the house record at Broadway's New Amsterdam Theatre taking $1,614,428.00 in the week ending 12th October.  That's the second time this year that the show has set a new house record!!  Congratulations everyone!!

It's the ensembles turn to shine this week as Aladdin's Bobby Pestka recently did a wide ranging interview with The Broadway Blog that's well worth checking out and Yurel Echezeretta will be taking part in the 6th annual Broadway Can! benefit on 16th November.  This annual concert of Seth Bisen-Hersh songs is being held to support City Harvest for New York's hungry.

Broadway World is reporting that Aladdin will be one of the exhibitors at the 6th annual At This Stage Education Expo at the Minskoff Theatre on Monday 27th October.  Further details can be found here.

And finally, this week Thomas Schumacher, President of Disney Theatrical, sat down with The Hollywood Reporter to discuss everything from The Lion King to Frozen.  In the process he touches on Aladdin and even drops some hints at possible Marvel and Lucasfilm properties that could one day make their way to stage.  If you're a Disney fan or a theatre fan then you owe it to yourself to read this.  It's a fantastic read and offers an incredible insight into Thomas Schumacher and Disney Theatrical.  And on an Aladdin related note - 4 more international productions are in development!!!  I really hope one of them is the rumoured West End production!!

Vacation Alert - Jonathan Freeman will be away from 22nd through 26th October and 8th-9th November.  Merwin Foard will once again be bringing the evil Vizier to life at those performances. 

Vacation Alert - Don Darryl Rivera will be out of the show from 28th-31st October.

Not quite Aladdin related but the Tuacahn Amphitheatre will be presenting 2 Menken musicals and a brand new Disney Revue show as their 2015 Broadway in the Desert season.  Early bird tickets are now on sale for Beauty and the Beast, Sister Act and the all new Disney's When You Wish.  If you've ever seen a show at Tuacahn then you know these will be very special indeed.

Ok, Hunchback time!

It's been a strange week for The Hunchback of Notre Dame news.  The show officially entered tech rehearsals this week and the biggest news came as Broadway World presented a first look at the beautiful set of the show only for the image to disappear almost as soon as it appeared (much like the early character concepts for Aladdin's Seattle run did).  For what it's worth I'll leave the link here in case the image comes back up.  The set looked great.  Very realistic compared to what we're used to from other Disney shows but it really fit Hunchback well.  I wish I had the picture to share with you but I'm sure more official images will be released very soon as the show begins in exactly a week's time!

The Rage has a great article on the show.  It's pages 22-23, and I'm pretty sure this is the first time that the show has officially been called "Broadway-bound" which is incredible news!  It notes that this new production will be very different to Berlin's Der Glockner Von Notre Dame, which was an incredibly large scale production, focusing "much more on the four main characters".  I can't wait to see what they've done with it!

And finally, happy birthday to Esmeralda herself, Ciara Renee!  I hope you have a wonderful day.