News

A revised, shortened version of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will come to Broadway in November.

The new version of the play clocks in at under three hours, including intermission, compared to the current running time of three-and-a-half hours. The new version will premiere on Broadway when new cast members take over and begin performances at Lyric Theatre on Nov. 12, 2024.

This marks the second time the play has been shortened while on Broadway. The original production, which opened on Broadway in April 2018, was shown in two parts which ran five hours and 15 minutes in total.

When the play returned to Broadway, following the shutdown of all theaters due to the pandemic, it returned as a one-part play running at three-and-a-half hours. At the time, producers Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender cited the difficulty of bringing back such a large-scale show, as well as the commercial challenges and reduced tourism...

Don’t ask Thom Yorke about a possible Radiohead reunion. Or if you do, expect the musician refuse to give you a real answer. The frontman spoke to Australia’s Double J, who suggested that Yorke’s “fertile” work on the Smile with guitarist Jonny Greenwood has led fans to assume there might be new Radiohead music coming.

“I am not aware of it and don’t really give a flying fuck,” Yorke replied. “No offence to anyone and thanks for caring. But I think we’ve earned the right...

Radiohead is collaborating on a new stage production of Hamlet, set to premiere next spring in Manchester, England. The play, Hamlet Hail to the Thief, is being adapted and directed by Christine Jones and Steven Hoggett and will feature re-worked music from Radiohead’s 2003 LP, Hail to the Thief.

The production will debut at Aviva Studios in Manchester from April 27 through May 18, 2025 before transferring to Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford Upon Avon, where it will run from June 4-28, 2025.

A press release notes that in this “fast-paced distillation of the play,...

Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke has teamed with Tony and Olivier Award-winning directors Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones to create a contemporary adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet scored by Radiohead’s 2003 album Hail to the Thief.

Titled Hamlet Hail To The Thief, the project will run at Aviva Studios in Manchester from 27 April – 18 May 2025 before transferring to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford, where it will run from June 4 – 28, 2025.

Described as a “fast-paced distillation” of the play, producers have said Shakespeare’s words and Radiohead’s album “illuminate one another” as Radiohead’s music becomes a central part of the play’s narrative. The play is said to have been “personally reworked by Yorke.” The music will be performed live onstage by a cast of 20 musicians and actors.

“This is an interesting and intimidating challenge,” Yorke said of the production. “Adapting the original music of Hail To The Thief for...

Broadway’s A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical will play its final performance on Sunday, June 30, before launching a national tour this fall, producers announced today.

The musical, which began previews on November 2, 2022, at the Broadhurst Theatre and opened that year on December 4, will have played 35 preview performances and 657 regular performances when it closes.

The announcement was made today by producers Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio, who said the production had grossed nearly $63M as of this week.

The musical, which charts the life and career of pop superstar Diamond and includes such hits as “Sweet Caroline,” “Cherry, Cherry” and “Solitary Man,” has seen up-and-down attendance in recent months, with figures for last week indicating that attendance was at just 65% of capacity. The show was one of only several that did not play to attendance of more than 90% capacity during the busy Presidents Day holiday week.

A North American...

“Le Freaks” will come out at night starting July 27 as Spiegelworld transforms 3535 Las Vegas Blvd. (The Linq hotel-casino) into the epicenter of four-on-the-floor beats and mirror balls with the debut of Discoshow.

More than four years in the making, Discoshow is the latest spectacle from the Las Vegas show producer that characterizes its style of entertainment as “human circus,” led by wizard of “Oz” Ross Mollison. It joins a compendium of Spiegelworld productions, including Absinthe at Caesars, Atomic Saloon in Venetian and The Hook at Caesars Atlantic City, along with bi-coastal versions of psychedelic Italian-American restaurant Superfrico at The Cosmopolitan and Caesars Atlantic City.

Mollison believes that Las Vegas audiences will love disco, even if they don’t know it yet. “We’re wired for disco. It goes through into our soul. People also want an excuse to go out and party. So much of what is produced now is so serious,...

Will Swenson will play his final performance as Neil Diamond in Broadway’s A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical on Sunday, Oct. 29, producers announced today.

A replacement for the starring role will be announced at a future date.

“It’s been the thrill of a lifetime to get to stand in Neil’s shoes,” Swenson said in a statement. “It’s been such an incredible honor to get to know Neil, to tell his powerful story, and bring his amazing songs to Broadway audiences every night. I’m immensely proud of the moving, beautiful show we made. I will miss it very much.”

A reason for Swenson’s departure was not disclosed, but his planned departure date suggests a year-long contract coming to a close: He and the bio-musical began previews at the Broadhurst Theatre last Nov. 2 (official opening was Dec. 4).

“Making A Beautiful Noise with Will Swenson was a deep and wonderful experience,...

Tony Awards nominations were announced on Tuesday, May 2 by Lea Michele and Myles Frost. While the nominations for the 76th annual Tony Awards were determined by 40 theatre professionals, winners were decided by over 750 members of the Broadway community.

A whopping 38 shows were eligible for consideration by the nominating committee. On the play side, there were 17 original works and six revivals in the running for nominations. Over on the musical side, nine new tuners were in contention for bids as were six musical revivals. The cutoff date for eligibility was April 27.

The Tony Awards are set for June 12 at United Palace Theatre in Washington Heights and will be hosted for the second year in a row by Oscar winner Ariana DeBose. The earlier “Act One” ceremony will be hosted by Julianne Hough and Skylar Astin.

Musicals

Best Musical

& Juliet

X — Kimberly Akimbo

New York, New York

Shucked

Some Like It Hot...

When Jesse Green wrote in his New York Times review of this season’s revival of “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” that the show had been “restored to its proper size,” he meant its orchestrations, staging, and ensemble, but he could have been forecasting its Tony Awards nominations success, too. This most recent remounting of the legendary Stephen Sondheim musical received eight Tony bids, the most of any musical revival of the year. But how does it stack up against the original production and the two revivals that preceded it?

While this “Sweeney” is back to its original scale, it is actually just shy of the very first production in terms of the Tonys, missing its nominations record by one. The original from 1979 netted nine bids for Best Musical, Director (Hal Prince), Actor (Len Cariou), Actress (Angela Lansbury), Score, Book, and Scenic, Costume and Lighting Designs. The...

The 2023 Tony Awards nominations were announced on Tuesday, May 2 by Lea Michele and Myles Frost. The reveal of the roster of contenders was carried on the Tonys YouTube channel. While the nominations for the 76th annual Tony Awards were determined by a few dozen theater professionals, winners will be decided by upwards of 800 members of the Broadway community.

A whopping 38 shows were eligible for consideration by the nominating committee. On the play side, there are 17 original works and six revivals in the running. Over on the musical side, nine new tuners were in contention as were six musical revivals. The cutoff date for eligibility was April 27.

The Tony Awards are set for June 12 at United Palace Theatre in Washington Heights and will be hosted for the second year in a row by Oscar winner Ariana DeBose.

The 2023 Tony Awards nominations list below includes all 26 competitive categories.

Musicals

Best Musical

& Juliet

Kimberly Akimbo

New York,...

The power of "Sweeney Todd" lies in its ability to seduce its audience to stare (and chortle) at the ingenuity of murderous cannibalism. Since its 1979 opening on Broadway (starring Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury), the darkly comic "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street" has been a general favorite of Stephen Sondheim's musicals (depending on who you ask). It exists at the intersection of traditional musical theatre and operetta, permitting a flexible theatricality from the small-scale (John Doyle's 2005 version and the 2017 Barrow Street immersive pie shop staging) to the grandiose opera stage. In the hands of "Hamilton" director Thomas Kail, "Sweeney Todd" stays true to its theatrical technicalities on the Broadway stage for the most part.

Inspired by the 1840s penny dreadful serial and Christopher Bond's 1973 stage retelling, Hugh Wheeler's book deals with injustice in 19th-century London. "Sweeney Todd" follows the eponymous barber who returns...

First “Company,” then “Into the Woods,” and now the demon barber of Fleet Street. In the year or so since legendary composer Stephen Sondheim’s death, Broadway has seen an increasing number of revivals of his works. The trend continued on March 26 at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre with the opening of a new production of his masterpiece, “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.” Tony nominee and internationally-renowned vocalist Josh Groban plays the menacing title role as the wronged barber out for revenge, starring opposite Tony winner Annaleigh Ashford as Mrs. Lovett, the schemer who devises baking Todd’s victims into meat pies in an austere nineteenth-century London.

Led by Tony-winning “Hamilton” director Thomas Kail, the ensemble also boasts Tony winner Ruthie Ann Miles (“The King and I”), Jordan Fisher, Gaten Matarazzo, and many others amongst its 25 players. Kail has also enlisted three-time Tony winner Alex Lacamoire as music supervisor...

In a Broadway season that might be remembered for a lovely, pared-down minimalism – the intriguing starkness of A Doll’s House with Jessica Chastain, the less-is-more near-concert-style presentations of Into the Woods and Parade – director Thomas Kail’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street will stand out for, among many other attributes, its full-on, unabashed ambition. A prodigious theatrical event that aims for greatness and achieves it, this revival of the Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler masterpiece is not to be missed.

With Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford leading a flawless, 25-member cast that also includes Stranger Things‘ Gaten Matarazzo, the revival, opening tonight at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, makes the case that Sweeney just might be Sondheim’s greatest work (at least until the next production of Sunday in the Park comes...

Click here to read the full article.

Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford will return to Broadway this spring in a revival of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

The revival of the Stephen Sondheim musical will be helmed by Hamilton director Thomas Kail and produced by Hamilton producer Jeffrey Seller. Sweeney Todd will play the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, with previews set to begin on February 26, 2023 ahead of a March 26 opening night.

The musical, which features a score by Sondheim and a book by Hugh Wheeler, originally premiered on Broadway in 1979 and was last revived on Broadway in 2005, in a production that starred Patti LuPone and Michael Cerveris and called on its actors to play instruments. This revival will bring back a 26-person orchestra for the first time since the original production, with Alex Lacamoire as music supervisor.

Sweeney Todd tells the story of a murderous barber living in London in the mid-1800s.

As widely speculated, a new Broadway production of the Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler classic musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street starring Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford will begin performances on February 26, 2023, at Broadway’s Lunt-Fontanne Theatre with an official opening night of March 26, 2023.

Directing will be Thomas Kail (Hamilton). The news was announced today by producer Jeffrey Seller, who is leading the revival.

Additional casting will be announced at a later date.

The production will mark the first time since 1980 that Broadway audiences will experience Sweeney Todd as it was performed in the original production, with a Jonathan Tunick’s original 26-player orchestration. Alex Lacamoire will serve as Music Supervisor, and Steven Hoggett choreographs with set design by Mimi Lien, costume design by Emilio Sosa, lighting design by Natasha Katz and sound design by Nevin Steinberg.

Groban will play Sweeney Todd,...

As expected, A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical is heading to Broadway, with producers announcing today that previews will begin Wednesday, November 2, at the Broadhurst Theatre, with an official opening night on Sunday, Dec. 4.

The musical, which features a score of Diamond’s songs, currently is in rehearsals in New York for its upcoming world premiere at Boston’s Emerson Colonial Theatre, where it will play a strictly limited six-week engagement from Tuesday, June 21 through Sunday, July 31.

The New York dates were announced today by producers Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio. The producers note that the Broadway dates coincide with the 50th anniversary of a series of concerts Diamond gave in October 1972 at Broadway’s Winter Garden Theatre.

Casting for the Broadway production of A Beautiful Noise will be announced soon. Last month, Deadline reported that the Boston cast would include Tony Award nominees Will Swenson, Mark Jacoby and Robyn Hurder,...

Exclusive: The upcoming pre-Broadway world premiere engagement of A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical in Boston has cast Tony Award nominees Mark Jacoby and Robyn Hurder, and Linda Powell to its cast, producers said today.

Jacoby will play the musical icon as he is now, while the previously announced Will Swenson will portray Diamond as a young man. Jacoby’s casting is the first indication that A Beautiful Noise will include two actors portraying the singer-songwriter.

“Neil Diamond has had a myriad of career highs which are a joy to celebrate, but sometimes as artists we look back and only see the mistakes, the roads not taken, the failures, and the aftermath success can leave behind,” said director Michael Mayer in a statement. “Anthony McCarten’s book for A Beautiful Noise beautifully weaves these two perspectives together: the highs and the lows, looking forward and looking back, the artist...

The Tony-nominated actor Will Swenson has been cast as Neil Diamond in the Broadway-bound musical about the “Sweet Caroline” singer-songwriter, producers announced today.

Swenson will play the title role in A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical when the production makes its world premiere at Boston’s Emerson Colonial Theatre this summer. Producers Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio have indicated the musical is aimed at Broadway, though production dates and specific plans for New York have not been announced.

Swenson, whose Broadway credits include his Tony-nominated performance in Diane Paulus’ production of Hair and most recently starred in the acclaimed Off Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim’s Assassins, has been cast as Diamond for the six-week Boston engagement that kicks off Tuesday, June 21, and plays through Sunday, July 31.

A Beautiful Noise tells Diamond’s life story and includes a score of his many hit songs. The musical features a book...

Update, with new start date The new, one-play version of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will begin performances four days earlier than previously announced, with the start now set for Friday, Nov. 12, at Broadway’s Lyric Theatre. No reason for the move was detailed in the announcement today.

Previous, June 28 A new version of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is returning to North American stages as a one-show experience.

The world premiere theatrical event will take place November 16 at Broadway’s Lyric Theatre in New York. The show will debut at the Curran in San Francisco on January 11. The Canadian premiere will begin performances in May at the Ed Mirvish Theatre in Toronto. Cursed Child was previously a two-part event.

“Collaborating on Harry Potter and the Cursed Child has been one of the great joys of my professional life,” author J.K. Rowling said. “While no one would wish...

The previously untitled Broadway musical based on the life of Neil Diamond now has a name.

Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio, the producers on the show, announced on Tuesday that A Beautiful Noise will have its world premiere at Boston’s Emerson Colonial Theatre next summer in a limited four-week engagement. Performances will begin Tuesday, June 21st, 2022, and play through Sunday, July 17th, 2022, before the show heads to Broadway.

“I’ve had the joy of coming to Boston on countless occasions, but one of the most special was my 2013 trip...

A Beautiful Noise, the new name for the previously untitled Broadway-bound musical about the life and songs of Neil Diamond, will stage its world premiere at Boston’s Emerson Colonial Theatre in June 2022, producers Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio announced today.

“I’ve had the joy of coming to Boston on countless occasions,” Diamond said in a statement, “but one of the most special was my 2013 trip to Fenway where I had the honor of being part of a moment of relief, unity, strength, and love. Next summer, when A Beautiful Noise has its first performance at the Emerson Colonial Theatre, and we’re all able to safely be in the same space together, experiencing the thrill of live theater, I imagine those same emotions will wash over me and the entire audience. Relief… Unity… Strength… Love… I can’t wait to share that experience.”

The musical, with a book...

We’ve unearthed the running order of the 2018 Tony Awards hosted by Sara Bareilles and Josh Groban on CBS on Sunday, June 10. Over the course of upwards of three-and-half-hours, winners will be announced in 26 competitive categories. Below is the order in which the 72nd Tonys will unfold.

The eight design awards will be handed out in the half hour before the show goes live at 8 p.m. Et as will the Tony for Best Orchestrations. Those winners will be showcased throughout the telecast, with inserts of their acceptance speeches.

As usual, the first award on the broadcast will be one of the featured acting races (this year it is on the musical side of the aisle) while the show closes with a big one, Best Musical. In between, the winners of the other 15 Tonys races will be revealed as detailed in the presentation order below.

See 2018 Tony Awards: When does the show start on Sunday,...

The 2018 Tony Awards take place on Sunday, June 10 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall. The three-hour ceremony hosted by two past nominees, composer Sara Bareilles (“Waitress”) and actor Josh Groban, will air on CBS. Those in the Eastern and Central time zones can see it live while those in the Mountain and Pacific time zones have a three-hour tape delay.

Thirty shows were eligible for consideration. A whopping 21 of these reaped at least one bid across the 26 Tony Awards categories. While the nominations were determined by 51 theater professionals, the 2018 Tonys winners will be decided by 842 members of the Broadway community.

See 2018 Tony Awards: When does the show start on Sunday, who are the hosts and presenters and what will win?

Two new musicals – “Mean Girls” and “SpongeBob SquarePants” — earned a leading dozen Tony Awards nominations apiece while “The Band’s Visit,” had to settle for 11 bids. Among new plays,...

The magic of Broadway’s Harry Potter and The Cursed Child can be as simple as a lightning-quick costume change, as startling as a bolt of fire sent blazing from a wizard’s wand and as spooky as the 100% convincing Dementors that float, wraith-like, over the audience at the Lyric Theatre.

None of it would work, of course, without the onstage magicians themselves – a cast led by the erstwhile (and grown-up) Harry himself, Jamie Parker. The British actor, who won an Olivier Award for his Potter portrayal on the London stage and is now Tony-nominated as lead actor in a play, is perhaps best known for his role as Scripps in both the play and film versions of Alan Bennett’s The History Boys.

Or was, until Harry came along. Shape-shifting into a character assumed to forever belong to another actor – that Radcliffe kid – Parker pulls off a magic trick...

The 2018 Tony Awards will take place on Sunday, June 10 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall and will air live on CBS. Nominees were announced today by Tony winner Leslie Odom, Jr. (“Hamilton”) and “American Idol” Katharine McPhee,who is starring in the Broadway musical “Waitress.” While the nominations were determined by 51 theater professionals, the 2018 Tonys winners will be decided by 863 members of the Broadway community. (Read the full report on the 2018 Tony Awards nominations.)

The Tony Awards have lined up two past nominees — composer Sara Bareilles and actor Josh Groban — to host the 72nd annual edition of these top theater honors. Bareilles lost her 2016 bid for Best Score for “Waitress” to Lin-Manuel Miranda for “Hamilton.” Groban contended last year for his lead role in the tuner “Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812,” but was bested by Ben Platt (“Dear Evan Hansen”).

Musicals

Best Musical

“Frozen”

“Mean Girls”

“SpongeBob SquarePants...

This is no time for bogus expressions of sophistication. So, let’s just say: Hooray! With “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” the Boy Who Lived has finally come to Broadway, bringing enchantment to a world that could really use a little magic right now.

The show’s savvy producers have done a wonderful job refurbishing the vintage Lyric Theater (circa 1903), both inside and out. The sculpture of a giant black raven’s wing hangs over the theater marquee, and the iconic image of a boy crouched in a winged nest can be seen perched on the roof. They should also have spread new pavement out front, because there’s going to be a lot of foot traffic on 43rd Street over the next few years.

Inside, the walls are painted “raven plume,” while a midnight-blue carpet is emblazoned with the Hogwarts crest. How about ravens? You want ravens? Just look up.

Broadway’s Frozen will be Tony Award-eligible for Best Original Score despite a portion of it – and “Let It Go”, of course – coming from the movie.

That eligibility determination was one of seven made today by the Tony Awards Administration Committee. Other decisions include Frozen actresses Caissie Levy and Patti Murin both eligible in the leading role category, and Andrew Garfield eligible as a Leading Actor among the large cast of Angels in America.

Many of the determinations involve leading vs. featured categories: Both Laurie Metcalf and Alison Pill of Three Tall Women are eligible in featured, presumably leaving the lead spot to Glenda Jackson.

In the choreography category, Finn Caldwell, Steven Hoggett and Robby Graham will be considered jointly for Angels in America. Hoggett and Graham are credited with “movement” for the play, while Caldwell is credited as puppetry director.

John Lithgow’s one-man show Stories By Heart, a...

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. In the case of these images from the stage play of Let the Right One In, they may just have been underestimating that number. You want beauty? Here's beauty.

According to Live for Films, the critically-acclaimed South Bank Sky Arts award-winning production will transfer to London’s West End on 26 March for a strictly limited season. Based on the Swedish novel and cult-hit film by John Ajvide Lindqvist, Let The Right One In will be the first show to play the recently refurbished and re-opened Apollo Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue.

Tony and Olivier Award-winning director John Tiffany (Black Watch, Once) heads up a creative team including Olivier Award-winning associate director Steven Hoggett (Black Watch, Beautiful Burnout, American Idiot).

The cast includes Martin Quinn and Rebecca Benson, who reprise their original roles. Check out the images below.

Synopsis

Oskar is a bullied...

New York — It's been a knockout in Germany. Now Sylvester Stallone hopes a musical based on his beloved boxing film "Rocky" will also be a hit on Broadway.

Producers said Sunday they plan to get "Rocky" up and punching at the Winter Garden by February following a successful debut in Hamburg last fall.

Based on the Oscar-winning 1976 film, the musical features a score by "Ragtime" veterans Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens, and a story by Thomas Meehan, who wrote "The Producers" and "Hairspray."

Originally written in English but translated into German for its world premiere and billed as "Rocky: Das Musical," the show is produced by Stallone and Stage Entertainment USA.

"The reason I think it has worked so well there and why I think it'll work on Broadway is that, yes, it's a story about boxing, but the real story is actually an intimate, powerful and gritty and...

Producers of the Tony Award-winning Best Musical Once announced today that the production has recouped its capitalization after only 21 weeks (169 performances), faster than any new Broadway musical in more than a decade. Once is produced by Barbara Broccoli, John N. Hart Jr., Patrick Milling Smith, Frederick Zollo, Brian Carmody, Michael G. Wilson, Orin Wolf, The Shubert Organization and Executive Producer Robert Cole, in association with New York Theatre Workshop. Once opened on Sunday, March 18, 2012 at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre, and went on to win eight Tony Awards including Best Musical. The production was also named Best Musical by the New York Drama Critics Circle, Drama Desk, Drama League, Outer Critic Circle and Lucille Lortel Awards. Once features a book by award-winning Irish playwright & screenwriter, Enda Walsh (Penelope, Hunger, The New Electric Ballroom), the Academy Award-winning music and lyrics of Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, direction by the acclaimed John Tiffany...

Once begins previews on Broadway Tuesday, February 28, 2012 with an opening night set for Sunday, March 18, 2012. The production features the Academy Award-winning music and lyrics of Glen Hansard and Markta Irglov, a book by award-winning Irish playwright amp screenwriter, Enda Walsh Penelope, Hunger, The New Electric Ballroom, direction by the acclaimed Scottish director of Black Watch, John Tiffany, movement by Steven Hoggett Black Watch, American Idiot and musical direction by Martin Lowe Mamma Mia. The set and costume design are by five time Tony Award winner Bob Crowley The Coast of Utopia, Mary Poppins, lighting design is by Tony winner Natasha Katz Aida, The Coast of Utopia, and sound design is by Clive Goodwin.Previously, BroadwayWorld brought you a look at the marquee beginnings at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre and today we brings you a look at the complete exterior...

Open Call Auditions To Take Place This Spring

In Los Angeles, Toronto, Boston And Chicago

(New York, NY- February 23, 2011) The producers of the critically acclaimed American Idiot announced today that the Grammy® Award winning musical will launch a first national tour in the fall of 2011 in a city to be announced. Open call auditions, for all roles, will be held in Los Angeles, Toronto, Boston and Chicago this spring.

Open Call Audition Schedule:

Los Angeles: Saturday March 5th @ 10am

at Debbie Reynolds Studio, 6514 Lankershim Boulevard. North Hollywood, CA 91606

Toronto: Saturday March 26

Boston: Saturday April 9

Chicago: Saturday April 23

Locations and times for the open call auditions in Toronto, Boston and Chicago will be announced soon at http://www.facebook.com/americanidiotbroadway. The open call auditions are seeking male and female rock singers in their early to late 20’s. All hopefuls should bring a recent picture, resume and prepare a short rock song.

From the moment he steps on the stage of Broadway’s St. James Theater (or, actually, appears on a balcony high, high above the stage), Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong proves very much at home. Yes, it seems that punk and Broadway are compatible — at least they are in the rock opera American Idiot, which is getting a jolt of extra adrenaline and rock-star charisma with Armstrong playing 50 performances of the stage show, on select dates through Feb. 27. (You can check out my full review here.)

I’ve been a fan of American Idiot since it premiered last spring,...