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Ashley Loren and Christian Douglas will be Broadway’s next Satine and Christian, respectively, in Moulin Rouge! the Musical on Broadway. The pair will join the cast beginning Tuesday, July 22, 2025 at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre. They join alongside Wayne Brady as Harold Zidler and Taye Diggs as The Duke of Monroth. Solea Pfeiffer as Satine, Jordan Fisher as Christian, Austin Durant as Harold Zidler and Andy Karl as The Duke of Monroth play their final performance on Sunday, July 20th. Ashley Loren is a member of the original Broadway cast of Moulin Rouge! The Musical, having previously played the role of Satine. She’s also appeared in Jekyll & Hyde (Broadway revival), The Scarlet Pimpernel (Lincoln Center), Sweet Charity, Baz and American Idiot. On film, she can be seen in Be the Light and her TV credits include “This is Us” and “And Just Like...

Chicago will welcome back triple threat Charlotte d’Amboise in the role of “Roxie Hart” beginning Monday, May 26 and Sophie Carmen-Jones extends in the role of “Velma Kelly” through Sunday, August 10 at the Ambassador Theatre. About Charlotte d’Amboise She is thrilled to be revisiting her role as Roxie Hart in Chicago in which she won the Ovations Award, the Drama Critics Award, and the Bay Area Theatre Award for best actress in a musical. She has been nominated for two Tony Awards for Cassie in A Chorus Line and Jerome Robbins Broadway. Most recently she played Fastrada in Pippin (Outer Critics nomination and the Fred Astaire Award). Other Bway credits include Damn Yankees ( Fred Astaire Award), Sweet Charity (Fred Astaire Award), Contact, Company, Song & Dance, and Cats. She stared in The...

BroadwayWorld is saddened to report the passing of comedian and actress Ruth Buzzi at the age of 88, who passed away from complications of Alzheimer's disease at her home near Fort Worth, Texas, on Thursday, May 1. The news was first announced on her official social media page. Known for her expressive face, Buzzi had a long career in entertainment, performing in variety shows like Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, which won her a Golden Globe and five Emmy nominations. She was a graduate of Pasadena Playhouse's theatre program and appeared on Broadway in the original production of Sweet Charity starring Gwen Verdon. A contemporary of comediennes such as Carol Burnett, she also appeared on many other shows in the 1960s and 70s, including The...

Ruth Buzzi, who shot to nationwide fame as one of the stars of the 1960s TV comedy variety series Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-in, died May 1 from complications from Alzheimer’s disease at her home near Mingus, Texas. She was 88.

Her death was announced on her official Facebook page by family. Buzzi had suffered a disabling stroke in 2022. She had been in hospice care for several years.

Born July 24, 1936, in Westerly, Rhode Island, Buzzi began performing in musical and comedy revues during her college years. She moved to New York City after graduating and quickly found work in Off Broadway musical revues and TV commercials.

After appearing on early ’60s TV shows such as The Garry Moore Show and CBS’ The Entertainers, Buzzi was cast in her one and only Broadway show in 1966 as part of the original cast, along with Gwen Verdon, of the now-classic musical Sweet Charity.

In 1967, Buzzi...

Ruth Buzzi, who was so hilarious as the lonely spinster Gladys Ormphby, the lady who swung her handbag as a lethal weapon, on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In, has died. She was 88.

Buzzi died Thursday of complications from Alzheimer’s at her home near Fort Worth, Texas, her longtime rep, Mike Eisenstadt, told The Hollywood Reporter. In July 2022, her husband, actor Kent Perkins, revealed that she was “bedridden and incapacitated” after suffering a series of strokes.

Buzzi appeared in the original Broadway production of the musical comedy Sweet Charity, played Marlo Thomas’ pal Margie “Pete” Peterson on ABC’s That Girl, starred opposite Jim Nabors on a Saturday morning kids show, The Lost Saucer, and spent many years on Sesame Street.

Early on in her career, Buzzi had a comedy act with Dom DeLuise in which he played the incompetent magician Dominic the Great and she his assistant, Shakuntala.

Buzzi was...

by Nathaniel R

We've mentioned the low-profile Chita Rivera Awards a few times here at The Film Experience. The awards, named after the legendary Broadway performer of West Side Story, The Rink, Chicago, and Sweet Charity fame are a fun idea, honoring dance in both feature films and on Broadway (the more common place for dance to be honored). Since we love all three art forms and the namesake we are all for this! The 2025 honors will be their 7th installment.

This year's ceremony will be held in NYC on May 19 with the amazing Tony & Emmy winner Bebe Neuwirth as host. The most famous nominee this year is surely Jonathan Groff. While we've had an enormous crush on him for years, we swear that it's his abundant talent and not his beauty that have kept the fires burning. Plus mad respect for the surely difficult but highly welcome balancing act...

Bernadette Peters has long been heralded as one of legendary composer Stephen Sondheim’s greatest interpreters. The actress originated roles in Sunday in the Park With George and Into the Woods and starred in revivals of Gypsy, A Little Night Music, and Follies. Now, three years after Sondheim’s death, Peters has returned to Broadway to pay tribute to her long-time collaborator and friend in the revue Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends. If she receives recognition from the Tony Awards for her efforts, she could make history in the Best Featured Actress in a Musical category.

Peters earned her first Tony nomination in 1972 in Featured Actress for On the Town, which was her sixth Broadway production. She has received six additional nominations for Mack & Mabel, Sunday in the Park With George, Song and Dance, The Goodbye Girl, Annie Get Your Gun, and Gypsy — winning for Song and Dance and Annie Get Your Gun...

“It was pulling me, it was undeniable,” recalls Shannon Lewis of her desire to be a choreographer. "It was pulling me away from performing, and I was shocked to find out that I was Ok with that.” After a robust dance career with 10 Broadway credits under her belt, the artist felt her dreams shifting, and now she’s making her Broadway debut as choreographer with the Bobby Darin musical Just in Time. Lewis chatted with Gold Derby about creating dance moves for Jonathan Groff, working with unique stage restrictions, and creating sequences for Saturday Night Live in record time.

Lewis created a successful career for herself as a performer, dancing her way through demanding tracks in shows like Fosse, Contact, and Sweet Charity. But she slowly developed a “larger vision” that began echoing loudly in her head. “As a dancer, I became extremely good at being another person's muse,” she explains,...

Helen Gallagher, best known to soap fans for her role as matriarch Maeve Ryan on the ABC daytime drama series “Ryan’s Hope” has died. Gallagher passed away on Sunday, November 24. She was 98 years old.

Born July 19, 1926 in Brooklyn, New York, Gallagher was a two-time Tony Award winner and a three-time Daytime Emmy Award winner, who also appeared on the soap operas “Another World,” “All My Children” and “One Life to Live.”

The news of Gallagher’s passing was first announced by The Washington Post, which was confirmed by Edith Meeks, the executive and artistic director at the Herbert Berghof Studio, where Gallagher had a long affiliation. An official cause of death was not provided at press time.

Attending the American School of Ballet at just 15 years of age, Gallagher first gained recognition playing a ballerina on Broadway, where she performed in the corps of “Seven Lively Arts” and “Mr. Strauss Goes to Boston,...

Some sad news in entertainment. Actress Helen Gallagher, a two-time Daytime Emmy winner, passed away on Sunday, November 24 at the age of 98.

Gallagher is best known for her role as Ryan Hope’s matriarch, Maeve Ryan. The legendary performer was with the daytime drama throughout the show’s tenure from 1975 to 1989.

Helen Gallagher’s Legacy In The Industry

A Brooklyn native, Gallagher worked within the theatre on the New York stages, which spanned close to 70 years from 1944 to 2000. Her big break came in 1947, when she entered the role of ‘Nancy’ in the musical, High Button Shoes.

Gallagher was a constant figure on Broadway over the years, winning two Tonys for her performances in No, No, Nanette (1971) and Pal Joey (1952), and also scoring a Tony nomination for Sweet Charity in 1966.

Helen Gallagher’s Impact On Daytime Drama

Still, Helen may most fondly be remembered for the legendary role she played as Maeve Ryan on Ryan’s Hope.

Emmy-winning actress Helen Gallagher, who played Maeve Ryan on the ABC soap opera Ryan’s Hope, has died. She was 98. Her passing was confirmed by Edith Meeks, executive and artistic director at New York’s Herbert Berghof Studio, who told The Washington Post that Gallagher died on Sunday (November 24) at a hospital in Manhattan, New York. Gallagher taught a “Singing for the Musical Theater” class at the studio for many years. Born on July 19, 1926, in New York City, Gallagher first made her mark as a Broadway performer, appearing in productions such as Make a Wish, Hazel Flagg, Portofino, High Button Shoes, and Sweet Charity, for which she received a 1967 Tony Award nomination for Featured Actress. She won her first Tony Award in 1952 for her performance in the revival of Pal Joey and earned her second Tony in 1971 for her role in the revival of the musical No, No, Nanette. She also...

Helen Gallagher, who won Tony Awards for Pal Joey and No, No, Nanette before starring as Maeve Ryan in all 13 seasons of daytime soap Ryan’s Hope, died November 24. She was 98.

Playbill confirmed the news on social media.

Born on July 19, 1926, in New York City, Gallagher already was a singing, dancing and acting veteran of numerous Broadway shows when she was cast as Gladys Bumps in the Chicago-set 1952 musical Pal Joey. Starring opposite Harold Lang and Vivienne Segal, she won the Tony for Best Featured Actress in a Musical.

She went on to appear in such Golden Age Broadway musicals as The Pajama Game, Mame, Finian’s Rainbow and Sweet Charity, earning a second Featured Actress Tony nom for playing Mickie alongside Gwen Verdon and Ruth Buzzi. She also performed in revivals of such classics as Guys and Dolls and Brigadoon.

In 1970 she was cast as the original Lucille Early in Broadway’s No,...

Emmy winner Helen Gallagher, who played matriarch Maeve Ryan on the ABC soap Ryan’s Hope, has died at the age of 98, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Gallagher passed away on Sunday, her colleagues at the Herbert Berghof Studio in New York City announced. (She taught a musical theater singing class there.)

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Gallagher first gained fame as a stage actress on Broadway, appearing in productions of Sweet Charity,...

Helen Gallagher, the spunky Broadway triple threat who received two Tony Awards and starred as the matriarch Maeve Ryan for all 13-plus years of the ABC soap opera Ryan’s Hope, has died. She was 98.

Gallagher died Sunday at a hospital in Manhattan, Edith Meeks, executive and artistic director at New York’s Herbert Berghof Studio, told The Washington Post. Gallagher taught a class in “Singing for the Musical Theater” there for years.

The radiant singer, dancer and actress received her first Tony in 1952 for her portrayal of showgirl Gladys Bumps in a revival of the Rodgers & Hart musical Pal Joey, then landed another in 1971 for her turn as flapper Lucille Early, another wise-cracking character, in a revival of Busby Berkeley’s No, No, Nanette.

“When Miss Gallagher sings the blues of a lovelorn wife with piece of chiffon and a chorus of properly epicene tailor’s dummies, she makes the...

It’s Musicals Week at IndieWire. With “Wicked” about to sparkle over theaters, we’re celebrating the best of the movie-musical genre.

Bob Fosse only directed five features — “Sweet Charity,” “Cabaret,” “Lenny,” “All That Jazz,” and “Star 80” — but among filmmakers and cinephiles, his legend looms large in proportion to the abundance of his output. David Fincher, for example, frequently references Fosse as an influence alongside and equal to far more prolific directors like Steven Spielberg, William Friedkin, and John Carpenter. In “A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies,” Fosse is one of only a few post-classical studio era auteurs (alongside Stanley Kubrick and Clint Eastwood) that Scorsese deems worthy of inclusion alongside old masters like Orson Welles and Sam Fuller.

By only making a handful of movies in between stints revolutionizing American musical theater on Broadway, Fosse maintained a consistency any director would envy — he’s five...

Lady Gaga stays in character on Harlequin. It’s her companion to Joker: Folie a Deux, inspired by her role as Harley Quinn. But it’s a luxuriant album of jazzy swing, mostly standards, right in her sweet spot. Harlequin is in the swank mode of her Tony Bennett albums Cheek to Cheek and Love for Sale, as well as her Jazz & Piano residency in Vegas. It’s the first time she’s recorded standards since her beloved Bennett passed away last year. As she told Rolling Stone’s Angie Martoccio,...

Not since 2011’s Born This Way has Lady Gaga found a musical project big and brawny enough to contain her penchant for vocal bluster and over-the-top theatricality. But the singer turned actress’s role as Harley Quinn in Todd Phillips’s Joker: Folie à Deux and its companion album, Harlequin, seem to have given her all of the elbow room she needs to let her freak flag fly.

Harlequin, whose title refers to the stock pantomime figure after which Harley Quinn was named, aptly begins with an interpretation of “Good Morning,” originally sung by Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney, whose agile performances captured the heady elation of a romantic all-nighter. Gaga is no Frances Gumm, but she imbues a newly written opening verse with a dewy-eyed wonder. Then, though, she quickly reverts to the kind of mannered affectations that marred her jazz albums with Tony Bennett.

Several other songs on Harlequin—like “That’s Entertainment,...

“Folie à deux” means a kind of shared madness — possibly two extreme hearts on similar wavelength or maybe a clash inside one disturbed person’s head. When Arthur Fleck aka Joker meets Harleen “Lee” Quinel aka Harley Quinn in director/co-writer Todd Phillips’ audacious and head-spinning follow-up to his billion-dollar-grossing 2019 origin story, Joker: Folie à Deux is maybe all of that.

The first trailer for this new film, which could be called a musical but really is so much more than that one hook, used the underlying theme of Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s “What the World Needs Now Is Love,” and perhaps that ultimately is what Phillips and co-writer Scott Silver are trying to say. This meeting of the minds between Arthur (Joaquin Phoenix) and Lee (Lady Gaga) is indeed an odd love story in a world losing control.

An early inspiration for the filmmaker and his star,...

Kubrick's admiration for All That Jazz as the best movie is unusual, but actually makes a lot of sense. All That Jazz's legacy stems from its chaotic yet emotionally compelling narrative, mirroring the turbulent life of Bob Fosse. Despite being a departure from Kubrick's usual style, the dark and introspective nature of All That Jazz resonated with the filmmaker.

Throughout his career, Stanley Kubrick became known for his intense and often dark films, so at first glance, the movie he deemed to be the best may come as a surprise. Considered one of the greatest film directors of all time, Kubrick made movies from 1952 until his death in 1999. Stanley Kubrick's best movies are all lauded as classics, from 2001: A Space Odyssey to The Shining. The director's unique style and innovative filmmaking have had long-lasting effects on Hollywood. Not only did Stanley Kubrick make stand-out movies, but his influences were also rather distinct.

Out of all the winners (and also-rans) in the 26 competitive categories at the 2024 Tony Awards, 23 results stand out as particularly noteworthy when considered in the context of history. So what were this year’s most interesting facts, records, and milestones? Check out the complete list of winners here.

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1. The productions that received multiple Tony nominations, but went home empty-handed were “Back to the Future,” “Days of Wine and Roses,” “Doubt,” “Grey House,” “Here Lies Love,” “Lempicka,” “Mary Jane,” “Mother Play,” “The Notebook,” “Prayer for the French Republic” and “Water for Elephants.”

2. The individuals who had multiple nominations this year, but went home empty-handed were songwriter/orchestrator Will Butler (“Stereophonic”), lighting designer Isabella Byrd (“Cabaret” and “An Enemy of the People”), scenic designer dots (“Appropriate” and “An Enemy of the People”), songwriters/orchestrators Jamestown Revival (“The Outsiders”), lighting designer Natasha Katz...

Throughout the 1950s, big-budget musicals were de rigueur for Hollywood, and there was a sudden glut of epics that sported gigantic budgets, recognizable stars, and no small amount of studio hype. Such films were exhibited as touring roadshow productions, which was a great way for films to make fistfuls of cash. Roadshow epics were also, it should be noted, a concerted ploy by studios to distract audiences from the rising threat of television. Studios felt the need to invest a lot of money into musicals and epics, hoping the massive productions could draw people into theaters and keep the industry afloat.

One might logically predict, however, that Hollywood tried to ride the trend of epics for a little longer than was healthy, and foolish overspending eventually became common. The age of the "roadshow epic" pretty much came to a close with the release of the notorious bomb "Cleopatra" in 1963. 

But then,...

When the Tony Award nominations dust settled “Hell’s Kitchen” and “Stereophonic” received the most nominations with 13 each, followed by “The Outsiders” with 12, followed by the revivals of “Cabaret” with nine and “Appropriate” earning eight. Oscar-winner Ariana DeBose returns as host of the third consecutive year of the Tony Awards which CBS and Pluto will telecast June 16th from Lincoln Center.

How well to you know your Tony history? Here are some fun facts about the latest crop of nominees.

The revival of Stephen Sondheim’s 1981 musical “Merrily We Roll Along” earned seven nominations including best revival of a musical, best performance by an actor in a musical for Jonathan Groff, featured actor for Daniel Radcliffe, featured actress for Lindsay Mendez and best director for Maria Friedman (her sister Sonia Friedman is nominated for outstanding play for “Stereophonic”). The troubled original production of “Merrily We Roll Along’ only received a Tony nomination for original score.

A screen legend for over 70 years, Shirley MacLaine boasts a diverse career across Broadway, film, and television. With six Academy Award nominations and a Best Actress win for Terms of Endearment, she continues adding to her impressive filmography.

Born Shirley MacLean Beaty in Richmond, Virginia in 1934, she started her career as a dancer replacing Carol Haney in the Broadway production of The Pajama Game in 1954. She made her acting debut alongside John Forsythe in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Trouble with Harry (1955), followed by roles in Artists and Models (1955) and Around the World in 80 Days (1956). Her standout performance in Billy Wilder’s The Apartment (1960), starring alongside Jack Lemmon, earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress with Billy Wilder winning in the Best Picture and Director category.

She would go on to star in classics including All in a Night’s Work (1961), My Geisha (1962), Irma La Douce (1962), and Sweet Charity...

If Criterion24/7 hasn’t completely colonized your attention every time you open the Channel––this is to say: if you’re stronger than me––their May lineup may be of interest. First and foremost I’m happy to see a Michael Roemer triple-feature: his superlative Nothing But a Man, arriving in a Criterion Edition, and the recently rediscovered The Plot Against Harry and Vengeance is Mine, three distinct features that suggest a long-lost voice of American movies. Meanwhile, Nobuhiko Obayashi’s Antiwar Trilogy four by Sara Driver, and a wide collection from Ayoka Chenzira fill out the auteurist sets.

Series-wise, a highlight of 1999 goes beyond the well-established canon with films like Trick and Bye Bye Africa, while of course including Sofia Coppola, Michael Mann, Scorsese, and Claire Denis. Films starring Shirley Maclaine, a study of 1960s paranoia, and Columbia’s “golden era” (read: 1950-1961) are curated; meanwhile, The Breaking Ice,...

This year’s Tonys will be held on June 16, so the American Theatre Wing will likely be announcing its lifetime achievement award recipient in the near future. Who do you think should take home this prestigious trophy? It has gone to veteran stage performers, directors, choreographers, playwrights, songwriters, producers and designers. In some years we get multiple recipients.

Last year these honors went to legendary actor Joel Grey and composer John Kander. The following living female Broadway vets have also received this award in the past and thus won’t be chosen again: Jane Greenwood, Rosemary Harris and Graciela Daniele. Here are 10 possible women the Tonys could award, all veterans over the age of 65. Vote to let us know who you’d like to see honored.

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Debbie Allen

Two-time Tony nominated actress for her performances in revivals of “West Side Story...

Anyone who didn’t perfectly predict this year’s Oscar nominees for Best Costume Design and Best Production Design has a uniquely valid excuse. This applies to all but a tiny fraction of Gold Derby’s nearly 11,000 prognosticators, whose solid consensus ultimately conflicted with the academy’s highly unusual decision to populate both categories with the same five films: “Barbie,” “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “Napoleon,” “Oppenheimer,” and “Poor Things.” Since these two craft races have only been completely congruent twice before, it’s especially understandable that very few people anticipated this outcome.

The film that mainly tripped folks up in this case was “Napoleon,” which garnered support from only 49.9% of our users in the costume design race and scraped by with a production design backing rate of just 7.5%. In the former category, many had trouble settling on two of four on-the-bubble candidates, while the latter’s pesky fifth slot...

Chita Rivera, the sultry singer, dancer and actress who commanded the Broadway stage for more than a half-century, has died. She was 91.

Rivera died peacefully in New York on Tuesday, following a brief illness, her daughter, Lisa Mordente, shared in a statement obtained by The Hollywood Reporter.

Known for her long, sleek legs, smoldering green eyes and lusty singing voice, the two-time Tony Award winner originated some of musical theater’s most iconic characters.

When West Side Story bowed in 1957, it was Rivera singing about life in America as the fiery Puerto Rican transplant Anita. As Rose Grant, the long-suffering girlfriend of songwriter Albert Peterson, Rivera received top billing over Dick Van Dyke in 1960’s Bye Bye Birdie. In 1975, she made the stage sizzle with “All That Jazz” as Velma Kelly in Chicago. And the 1993 musical adaptation of Kiss of the Spider Woman put her in the spotlight as the sexy Spider Woman.

Chita Rivera, the beloved Broadway star of West Side Story, Chicago and Kiss of the Spider Woman, died today in New York following a brief illness. She was 91.

Her death was announced by her daughter, Lisa Mordente, who said that Rivera died peacefully.

One of America’s foremost Latina artists, Rivera was a groundbreaker, riveting critics and audiences alike with seminal performances of such soon-to-be Broadway standards as “America” and “A Boy Like That” from West Side Story and “All That Jazz” from Chicago. She was among the most nominated performers in Tony Award history – she earned 10 nominations, winning twice (for The Rink and Kiss of the Spider Woman) and receiving the 2018 Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre.

Rivera rocketed to fame in 1953 with Guys and Dolls, then cemented her stature as a Broadway leading lady in 1954 with Can-Can, Mr. Wonderful in 1956 and, in 1957, the role that...

Christina Applegate first graced television screens as a literal baby in an episode of Days of Our Lives. Since then, she has only gone from strength to strength as a performer and producer, earning several awards including a Primetime Emmy for her scene-stealing guest role on Friends, a Theatre World Award for her turn as the titular Sweet Charity on Broadway, a People's Choice Award for her work on Samantha Who?, and a TV Land Award for her breakout role on the classic sitcom Married...with Children. From Kelly Bundy to her most recent role of Jen Harding in the Emmy-nominated Dead to Me, Applegate has been the anchor and heart of many great TV series.

Three attempts to make fetch happen: The original Mean Girls (top), the new Mean Girls adaptation (middle) and the Broadway version of Mean Girls (bottom) Image: Screenshot: Paramount Pictures, Lloyd Bishop/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images, Jojo Whilden/Paramount © 2023 Paramount Pictures Mean Girls, the movie-musical...

Three attempts to make fetch happen: The original Mean Girls (top), the new Mean Girls adaptation (middle) and the Broadway version of Mean Girls (bottom)Image: Screenshot: Paramount Pictures, Lloyd Bishop/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images, Jojo Whilden/Paramount © 2023 Paramount Pictures (Getty Images)

Mean Girls,...

Peter Berkos, the Universal Pictures sound effects maestro and champion of sound editors everywhere who shared a special achievement Oscar for his work on the Robert Wise-directed disaster epic The Hindenburg, has died. He was 101.

Berkos died Tuesday in Rancho Bernardo, California, his friend Brae Wyckoff told The Hollywood Reporter.

While president of the Motion Picture Sound Editors from 1963-66, Berkos began a successful campaign for his colleagues to gain full membership into the film and television academies and to receive credit onscreen and off for their work.

Berkos himself was uncredited for the first 20 years of his career until Car Wash (1976), and the Oscars would eventually revive its dormant competitive sound effects category from 1983 onward.

Across four decades, he worked for Universal on such films as Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil (1958), four features directed by George Roy Hill — Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967), the Oscar best picture winner The Sting...

Herman “Hy” Levine, a 48-year veteran of the film industry who rose through the marketing ranks at Universal and Disney, died Dec. 27 in Rockville, Md. after suffering from pancreatic cancer. He was 87.

Levine was an executive Disney from 1986 to 1998, rising to the rank of Vice President of Co-Op Advertising at the time when the studio began stepping up its movie output under CEO Michael Eisner after a particularly fallow period in the early 1980s. In his position, Levine was responsible for print and outdoor advertising on all Disney features, including those that fell under the Touchstone and Hollywood Pictures banners.

Among the films Levine helped launch were such animated megahits as “The Lion King,” “Aladdin” and “The Little Mermaid” as well as live-action titles such as “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?,” “Down and Out in Beverly Hills” and “Beaches.” Levine worked closely with then film marketing chief Bob Levin as...

Herman (Hy) Levine, who had a nearly 50-year career in the film industry and worked with Lew Wasserman, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Dick Cook, and many other prominent executives, has died at 87.

Levine died Dec. 27 in Rockville, MD, following a short battle with pancreatic cancer, according to his son, Stuart Levine, who is the VP editorial and media relations at NBCUniversal Television and Streaming.

Levine was at Disney from 1986-1998 and rose to VP of co-op advertising at the time when the studio was accelerating its film output after a particularly fallow period. In his position, Levine was responsible for the print and outdoor advertising for all the Disney features, which also fell under the Touchstone and Hollywood Pictures banner.

Among the many films where Levine played a vital role in their success were The Lion King, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Down and Out in Beverly Hills and Beaches.

He sings and he dances! But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t work. Timothée Chalamet had a three-month dance boot camp to prepare for “Wonka” — but luckily veteran choreographer Christopher Gattelli was there to guide him.

“The first lesson I had with him was actually in May of 2021. He was shooting ‘Bones and All’ at the time, and he came in with like this shocking red magenta hair and like super, super skinny Timmy and I was like, ‘Oh my God, that’s not what I was expecting.'” But Gattelli pointed out that with Chalamet’s famous background at Laguardia High School, it wasn’t like starting from scratch. “And he has really great rhythm, so it wasn’t hard for him to pick it up.”

“Boot camp” sounds like Gattelli turned into the kind of strict dance instructor who terrifies his students, when in reality he’s warm and quick to laugh,...

Graphic: The A.V. Club A year ago we couldn’t have said definitively whether Wonka would be a delightful musical extravaganza or a total disaster. Either outcome seemed plausible. After all, was anyone actually clamoring for yet another version of the mysterious, magical chocolatier from Roald Dahl’s beloved book series?...

Timothée Chalomet in WonkaPhoto: Jaap Buittendijk/Warner Bros.

A year ago we couldn’t have said definitively whether Wonka would be a delightful musical extravaganza or a total disaster. Either outcome seemed plausible. After all, was anyone actually clamoring for yet another version of the mysterious, magical chocolatier from Roald Dahl’s beloved book series?...

The soundtrack to Greta Gerwig's "Barbie" movie is full of wall-to-wall bangers, but the bombastic anthem "I'm Just Ken" has become a bonafide (and charting) sensation. And to think that the song almost had a much smaller presence in the film. In an exclusive featurette from Vudu to promote the highest-grossing film of the year's arrival on video on demand. Gerwig, music producer Mark Ronson, Ryan Gosling, Ncuti Gatwa, and others discuss how the now-beloved scene came to be. Ronson's song was originally just a short little ditty, but Gerwig loved it so much she wanted more.

"It went from being this song that was maybe gonna be played somewhere in the film to this song that they built this epic battle around," Ronson said. Once Gerwig heard the song, she wanted more — which became the nearly 11-minute long song.

The goal was to use the song as...

With “Dancing with the Stars” set to come back for a 32nd season this fall on ABC after spending last year on Disney+, there’s a long list of celebrities who deserve to compete on the dance floor. Two of my previous suggestions came true: Frankie Muniz (who came in third in season 25) and Kel Mitchell (who came in second in season 28). Below is a list of female stars I think the show should consider inviting to the ballroom to vie for the next Mirror Ball Trophy. Do you agree with my picks? Vote in our poll at the bottom of this post to let us know which you’d most like to see on “DWTS.” And feel free to let us know in the comments what other stars you would like to see when the show comes back in September.

SEEEverything to know about ‘Dancing with the Stars’ Season...

[Editor’s note: The following interview contains spoilers.]

Of all the movie references crammed into Greta Gerwig’s blockbuster “Barbie,” the most important is “The Matrix” because it serves as the foundational basis for Barbie’s (Margot Robbie) journey from the feminism of Barbie Land to the patriarchal “real world” of Century City and Venice.

That’s the moment, of course, when Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon) offers Robbie’s Stereotypical Barbie the choice of maintaining the status quo with the pink heel or escaping to the real world in a Birkenstock to solve her existential crisis.

For production designer Sarah Greenwood and set decorator Katie Spencer (who have six Oscar nominations between them), Barbie Land was unknown territory. But it was instructive to have the contrast between Barbie Land and L.A. in the script by Gerwig and Noah Baumbach.

“Not that it’s real, but L.A. was a given,” Greenwood told IndieWire. “Even though we’re [British] outsiders,...

Dean Smith, who won a gold medal as a sprinter at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics before becoming a top-notch Hollywood stunt performer who worked on a dozen films starring John Wayne, has died. He was 91.

Smith died Saturday at his home in Breckenridge, Texas, after a battle with cancer, his friend Rob Word told The Hollywood Reporter.

Smith, who got into the business with help from James Garner, appeared in seven Paul Newman films, including Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972), The Sting (1973) and The Towering Inferno (1974).

The tough Texan, who loved to say he could “ride, run and jump,” doubled for good friend Dale Robertson on the 1957-62 NBC series Tales of Wells Fargo, the 1964 film Blood on the Arrow and the 1966-68 ABC series Iron Horse.

He also did the dirty work for Ben Johnson...

If you were one of the 4.3 million viewers who tuned into the 2023 Tony Awards on CBS or Paramount+ this past Sunday, you’re hopefully well on your way to becoming a full-fledged Broadway baby, if you’re not there already. The awards telecast, which celebrates and honors the best of Broadway, also serves as theatre’s biggest marketing campaign, often providing the first look for many people across the country at the plays and musicals that are currently on Broadway’s boards.

So, if the Tony Awards got you excited about live theatre, but a trip to the Great White Way isn’t in your near future, Sling Freestream has a fantastic, free alternative for fans to watch some of their favorite performances from home. Here’s everything you need to know about the streamer’s Broadway On Demand channel.

Watch Now Free to stream sling.com Broadway On Demand...

This year’s Tony race for Best Musical Revival has two Stephen Sondheim shows (“Into the Woods” and “Sweeney Todd”) in contention. Will one of them win or will they cancel each other out? Let’s go over both of them.

“Into the Woods” combines several fairy tales and explores the consequences of the characters’ quests. The main storyline focuses on a childless baker and his wife as they go into the woods to break a spell set upon them by a witch. There they run into various classic fairy tale characters, all before revealing what happens after “happily ever after.”

The original production won three Tonys in 1988 for Best Actress (Musical) for Joanna Gleason, Best Musical Book for James Lapine, and Best Original Score for Sondheim. Meanwhile, Best Musical that year went to “The Phantom of the Opera,” which wound up with six other awards. The last remounting of...

Molly Ringwald recalls turning down the lead role of Vivian Ward in the romantic comedy Pretty Woman, opening up about why she chose to not join the film. Julia Roberts would ultimately portray Vivian Ward in Garry Marshall's 1990 movie, where she starred alongside Richard Gere and soon after receive widespread critical praise for her performance. In Pretty Woman, recently dumped wealthy corporate raider Edward Lewis meets prostitute Vivian, whom he hires as an escort to accompany him to numerous business events, as a connection between the two ultimately blooms.

While Roberts would ultimately lead Pretty Woman following Ringwald's refusal, The Breakfast Club star opened up in The Guardian about why she refused the role of Ward during the casting process. After praising Robert's performance, Ringwald explained that she didn't enjoy the story, revealing that she felt somewhat uncomfortable with it despite wanting to take on darker roles that would...

What if Sally Bowles was in Hair? What if Sweeney Todd got with Miss Hannigan?

These are the scenarios on Schmigadoon! Season 2 Episode 4.

Written by Raina Morris and directed by Alice Matthias, it's the darkest of anything we've seen in the Schmigaverse.

It gets heavy and melancholy but also gives us some truly tender and real moments. Life (and times) is hard, after all -- it's not all just song and dance. Even musicals aren't all happy anymore.

The scene between Melissa and Jenny was quite moving. It was just a traumatized girl with a friend trying to help her. There were no laughs, just a reminder of how broken and unhappy these characters are.

We haven't given costume designer Angus Strathie as much acknowledgment as he deserves.

Across the board, his costumes have been outstanding, but this episode had some fantastic pieces, namely Melissa's tangerine dream and Miss Codwell's yellow floral frock.

The cast and production team of the Apple TV+ hit musical comedy series “Schmigadoon!” that dropped its second season on the streamer April 5 beat a tuneful path to the TV Academy’s Saban Media Center in North Hollywood on a drizzly Thursday night, with castmates Cecily Strong, Keegan-Michael Key, Dove Cameron, Jane Krakowski, Aaron Tveit, Tituss Burgess and Jaime Camil joining co-creator/exec producer/showrunner Cinco Paul and exec producer Andrew Singer for a spirited screening and panel event.

The show received four Emmy nominations in 2022 to mark its first season, including for its production design, music composition, chorography and original music and lyrics, winning a trophy for the latter. And while continuing to build an audience in season two, there’s already talk of a third season, as Singer confirmed on the red carpet (actually a wooden carpet after everyone moved indoors to avoid the raindrops) that Apple had...

At the conclusion of Apple TV +’s delightful 2021 musical comedy “Schmigadoon!,” Melissa (Cecily Strong) and Josh (Keegan-Michael Key) realized they loved each other and returned to the real world. The second season finds them blissfully married, but boredom soon sets in. And to add insult to injury, they can’t get pregnant. The two decide they need a boost, so they decide to return to the cotton-candy colored tuneful world of Schmigadoon.

But what they find this time around is Schmicago, a much darker town they can’t leave until they find their happy ending. Happy endings, though, are few and far between in the city that never sleeps. And it certainly looks like the two won’t find one anytime soon after Josh is soon arrested for murdering a showgirl.

Schmicago is Fosse-fied with more than a few jazz hands reflecting the adult musicals of the 1960s and 1970s including “Chicago,...

If you love musicals, there is nothing better than Schmigadoon! Season 2.

On Schmigadoon! Season 2 Episode 1 Schmigadoon! Season 2 Episode 1, Melissa and Josh, married and discontent, try to recapture the magic they found in Schmigadoon, only to find the dark and gritty city of Schmicago.

However, since it's something different from their lives (as well as musical and magical), they decide to give it a shot, but neither of them really knows what they're in for.

As a musical theatre aficionado of the highest order, I shall do my level best to catch every wink and nod (and bump and grind), but this show is so jam-packed with references that some may slip by.

The city of Schmicago exists out-of-time, but obviously leans into the '20s and '30s of Chicago and Cabaret (Kander and Ebb's most enduring masterworks).

There are also hippies and, as we can glean from the opening number,...

“I tried to reference all of the stimulus in his head that led him to create amazing pieces of theater,” details director Wayne Cilento on honoring the legendary choreography of Bob Fosse. Cilento has crafted the first ever Broadway revival of “Dancin’,” but the show now comes appropriately billed as “Bob Fosse’s Dancin’” since the director was keen to go beyond what was presented in the original incarnation. ”I wanted to show his scope,” explains Cilento, ”I wanted to do more than what he presented in 1978.” Watch the exclusive video interview above.

Cilento starred in the original Broadway production of “Dancin’” and earned a Tony nomination for Featured Actor in a Musical for his performance. Cilento was not a Fosse dancer when he booked the show (he jokes that he had previously auditioned for “Chicago” but was “cut immediately”). But fellow dancer and choreographer Graciela Daniele put in a...

NYC Weekend Watch is our weekly round-up of repertory offerings.

Museum of the Moving Image

A series on Jeanne Dielman‘s influences brings the film itself and work by Snow, Bresson, and Pasolini; somewhat different from Jeanne Dielman, Godzilla vs. Megalon plays Friday and Sunday.

Anthology Film Archives

A Joe Dante retrospective begins; films by Luis Buñuel and Chaplin screen through the weekend in Essential Cinema.

Film Forum

The recently restored Finnish classic Eight Deadly Shots begins its two-part run; Bob Fosse’s Sweet Charity and The Conformist continue; two Harold Lloyd movies screen; The Jackie Robinson Story plays on 35mm this Sunday.

Film at Lincoln Center

The newly restored Drylongso continues screening. (Read our interview with director Cauleen Smith here.)

IFC Center

White Material, Chocolat, and Beau Travail offer a Claire Denis fix; Before Sunrise and Before Sunset screen, while Fight Club, Akira, Jaws, Barb Wire, and Poison Ivy have late showings,...