Oh sure, you can make webs come out of your wrists and climb, unaided, up the side of a 100 story building…but, can you sing and dance?

You’ll need to be able to do all that if you want to get the lead for the new Tony winner Julie Taymor musical “Spider-Man.”

Auditions for the part of Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson are being held on July 28th in Manhattan from 10AM to 5PM ET at The Knitting Factory on 74 Leonard Street.

This will be a major Broadway production with Taymor (”The Lion King”) set to direct the musical and Marvel onboard as one of the stage show’s producers.

For Spider Man you need to be a male approximately 16-20’s, a great rock ‘n roll voice. If your shooting for Mary Jane’s role you need to be a 16 to 20-something female who can sing and have that cute girl-next-door look about you. There is also a third role up for grabs simply described as The Principal Woman.

Bring your Spidey-suit and dancing shows.

Now I can honestly say, “I’ve heard it all!”

David Cronenberg’s 1986 horror flick, “The Fly,” has undergone a bizarre metamorphosis. It’s now an opera, according to the Associated Press.

If that wasn’t enough to make you say “What?”….famed opera tenor Placido Domingo will be conducting the musical score written by Oscar-winning composer Howard Shore (”The Lord of the Rings”) and Cronenberg himself will be showrunning the production.

While not as freakish as the movie, the opera will still be scary enough and contain its fair share of dark humor.

“Someone’s 6-year-old said, after seeing one of our rehearsals, that she thought she would have to sleep with her parents for a while,” stated Cronenberg. “So I guess it’s working.”

The opera will have its world premiere Wednesday at Paris’ Theatre du Chatelet and its U.S. premiere September 7 at the Los Angeles Opera.

“It is in some ways a translation of the movie to the stage,” Cronenberg said. “But it’s its own creature.”

Actress Kate Mulgrew, best known for her role as Captain Janeway on “Star Trek: Voyager,” will be joining Harry Potter stars Daniel Radcliffe and Richard Griffiths on stage for the Broadway production of “Equus.” Radcliffe starred in the same production on the London stage last year. Mulgrew will play the part of Hester Saloman.

Performances are set to begin on the Great White Way this September 25th at the Broadhurst Theatre at 235 W. 44 St. in New York. The show will run until February 8, 2009. To buy tickets, visit Telecharge.com.

If you’re going to be in the Chicago, Illinois area between now and March 30th, then we highly recommend you grab tickets to see the WildClaw Theatre presentation of an adaptation of Arthur Machen’s “The Great God Pan” playing at Chicago’s Athenaeum Theater. Showtimes are Thursday – Saturday 7:30 PM (CDT) and every Sunday at 3:00 PM (CDT).

“THE GREAT GOD PAN” is Arthur Machen’s classic tale about an horrific experiment performed upon an innocent young woman, resulting in a trail of sex, bloodletting, acts of horror and suicide spanning generations of time and crossing many countries. Machen’s Helen, beautifully portrayed by stage actress Lily Mojekwu, is the seductress personification of evil. The audience is taken on a journey into the depths of depravity as they watch Tom Hickey’s Clarke and Peter Corey’s Jones struggle to solve the mystery of the trail of suicides in 1888 London.

The stage play has been adapted and directed by Charley Sherman. The novel was first published in the 1890’s and became a very controversial book for its time due to its decadent mixture of sex and horror. One paper described it as “An incoherent nightmare of sex”. Another said it was “The most acutely and intentionally disagreeable book yet seen in English”.

However, over time this novel has proven to be one of the most influential horror stories of all time, inspiring writers such as H.P. Lovecraft, Stephen King, Clive Barker, and Peter Straub. In fact, Lovecraft once said of Machen, “Of creators of cosmic fear raised to its most artistic pitch, few can hope to equal Arthur Machen”.

This being the case the challenge for Sherman, his ensemble cast and exceptional crew has been to capture that same intense expression of fear upon the Chicago stage. If any indication from early reviews is to be noted, then he has succeeded perfectly in doing just that.

Time Out Chicago says, “If this is the WildClaw standard for horror, we’ll gladly be horrified again.”

The Chicagoist calls ‘The Great God Pan,’ “a truly knee-knocking show.”

Finally, from Talk Theater in Chicago comes this review: ”’The Great God Pan’ aptly explores the nature of evil and the search for evil’s true identity that unfolds with several unique twists. This major work is engaging and scary. The low budget production delivers several well-time moments that make you jump out of your seat.”

To order your tickets online go to WildClaw Theater.com.

Shrek, that lovable Ogre brought to life in three films and one TV Christmas special by Mike Meyers is heading for the Broadway stage, but without that signature voice from the famous comedian and, even though there has been no major stage star attached to the role to date, indications are that the stageplay and lyrics written by David Lindsay-Abaire and Jeanine Tesori will be a long running hit.

“Shrek the Musical,” will showcase all the movie’s familiar characters from Shrek, Donkey and Princess Fiona, who will be portrayed by actress/singer Sutton Foster (”Thoroughly Modern Millie,” “Little Women”). Christopher Sieber (”Monty Python’s Spamalot”) will star as the evil Lord Farquaad and Kecia Lewis-Evans has been brought in to portray Donkey’s wife, the Dragon. Donkey, the role so perfectly performed by Eddie Murphy in the animated feature films, has yet to be cast as well.

The musical opens on Broadway this coming December 14th at the Broadway Theatre after a trial run at the Seattle based Fifth Avenue Theater from August 14 thru September 21, 2008.

One month before the show’s grand Broadway premiere it will give a preview performance on November 8th.

“Shrek the Musical” will be based purely on the book by William Steig, and loosely on the three popular movies. One character yet to be mentioned is Puss, played by Antonio Banderas in two of the movies. Banderas is a well established Broadway performer himself leading some to wonder if he will end up being attached to the musical. Lending his name to the project would only enhance its chances of being a big success once it hits the Great White Way.

A generation’s favorite housekeeping nanny is back in the news. Producers Thomas Schumacker and Camaeron Mckintosh announced today that the Broadway stage version of the very popular “Mary Poppins” will go on tour around the world.

Already a successful Broadway production, the play is currently in its second year on the Great White Way. The stage version of the Julie Andrews/Dick Van Dyke film has been so successful that in less than two years it’s recouped its investment. With that news the producers felt it was ready to share this wonderful stage musical with the rest of the world and have embarked on a grand tour schedule that will take “Mary Poppins” throughout North America. And, beginning in June 2008, througout England (already in London for the last 2 years) and Australia (2009). Negotiations are currently underway to also bring the play to other parts of Europe and other countries as well.

“All at once, we have a lot of `Poppins,”‘ said Thomas Schumacher, president of Disney Theatrical Productions.

This tour will be quite an undertaking since the huge cast and crew, special stage effects, period costumes and lavish sets are very expensive and must be included because they are at the heart of the production.

“We’ve rebuilt the house,” Mackintosh said. “It works in a very different way. It still opens up to be more or less what you’ve seen (on Broadway), but how it does that is different.”

The North American tour will originate at the Cadillac Palace Theatre in Chicago, premiering there on March 25, 2009.

Productions have also been licensed for Stockholm, Sweden (October 2008), Copenhagen, Denmark (January 2009), and Budapest, Hungary (September 2009) - with more to come, including China and South Africa.

“The show is perhaps perceived by people who go to it very differently than the way the media talk about it, which is as `the Disney children’s show,”‘ the producer said. “When you think about it, `Mary Poppins’ is the only classic musical playing on Broadway now. It’s lush. It’s big. It has fantastic songs. It’s a story you are familiar with but perhaps haven’t seen told this way. That’s the pocket of people it hits.”

Because an entire generation was raised on Disney’s “Mary Poppins,” many still able to recite the lyrics to every song in the production, the audience for the staged musical has been full of adults who are introducing their own children to the world’s favorite nanny.

“If you’re 12 years old, you’re not that interested in `Mary Poppins,’ stated Mackintosh. “But if you are in that 35 to 40 to 60 range, the classic Broadway musical audience, it’s absolutely up your alley.”

Ewan McGregor wanted to do the role of villain Iago in Shakespeare’s “Othello” so badly that he will accept the standard London stage minimum wage of $790 per week (US) just to be a part of the production.

The actor, accustomed to bringing home a paycheck amounting in the millions of dollars for such films at the Star Wars sagas, “Island,” “Moulin Rouge” and “Black Hawk Down,” had no problem agreeing to the standard salary.

The 36-year-old actor is probably most known for his role as the younger version of Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars films 2 and 3. The late Sir Alec Quinness, another British actor famous for Shakespearean roles, portrayed the aging Obi-Wan in the original three episodes three decades ago.

The stage production will open on December 4, 2007. Golden Globe nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor (”Children of Men,” “Serenity”) will headline as the over jealous Othello, with Kelly Reilly portraying the beautiful, but, but precarious Desdemona. Reilly was nominated for the prestigious Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Actress in the 2003 stage production of “After Miss Julie.” At age 26, she was the youngest actress to be nominated for that category.

NEW YORK, AP - The world knows him as boy wizard Harry Potter. Now, Daniel Radcliffe wants the world to see him differently.

Next summer, the 17-year-old will take to a London stage in the Tony Award-winning drama “Equus” and will perform nude during one scene, according Newsweek magazine in editions that will hit newsstands Monday.

“Part of me wants to shake up people’s perception of me, just shove me in a blender,” he told the magazine in an exclusive interview on the set of the fifth Harry Potter film, “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.”

“It’s a really challenging play, and if I can pull it off — we don’t know if I can yet — I hope people will stop and think, ‘Maybe he can do something other than Harry,’” he said.

In “Equus,” Radcliffe will play a “troubled young man with a religious-erotic obsession with horses,” the magazine reported.

Radcliffe was discovered seven years ago in the audience of a London theater and is known for playing Potter in the blockbuster film series based on J.K. Rowling’s books.

[Above photo, courtesty of AP, shows British actor Daniel Radcliffe arriving for the 2006 Empire Film Awards in London, Monday March 13, 2006 - Photo by Max Nash]

Source: TV Guide

A workshop production of the stage musical adaptation of Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein is but weeks away, and still the project has yet to find it’s Dr. Frankenstein (that’s pronounced Frahnken-shteen). Per the New York Post, the producers’ first choice was (of course) Hugh Jackman, but the Boy from Oz is simply too busy with films. A few days ago, SNL alum Jimmy Fallon threw his lab coat into the ring with an audition that “went well,” but the front-runner may actually be Tom “Ed” Cavanagh, says the Post. Already in place on the cast are Kristin Chenoweth as Inga, Sutton Foster (in the Madeleine Kahn role), Desperate Housewives’ Roger Bart as Igor, and Cloris Leachman (reprising her film role of Frau Blücher.)

Submitted by: Kyle Nin (SoSF Staff Reporter)

According to the New York Post, Mel Brooks and co-writer Thomas Meehan have delivered the first draft of the Broadway edition of “Young Frankenstein” to director Susan Strohman, who will stage a workshop of the musical adaptation for prospective backers in October 2006.

There have been no actors, as yet, officially attached to the project however, rumor has it that Kristin Chenoweth (West Wing, Stranger Than Fiction) may be up for the part of Inga, while Cloris Leachman is being wooed to reprise her film role of Frau Blücher.

Source: TV Guide
Posted by: Matt Webb Mitovich

The $24 million, 3½-hour stage adaptation of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, which has been playing in Toronto and is believed to be the most expensive stage show ever mounted, will close on Sept. 3, it was announced on Wednesday. There is still talk that the production, met by such critical reactions as “disappointing” and “overwhelmed by complexity,” will reopen in London next year in a trimmed-down version.

Submitted by: Kyle Nin (SoSF Staff Reporter)

The latest in the book-to movie-to stage development is the adaptation of Dr. Seuss for the Broadway stage.

News from the Great White Way is that a certain group of producers are looking to turn that thing with the nasty attitude and green haired Grinch into a big stage extravaganza Broadway musical adaptation of Dr. Seuss’ “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”

The other news is that the producers are looking more to the Ron Howard/Jim Carrey film collaboration for their inspiration instead of the actual Dr. Seuss book. Two words - BAD IDEA! As much as I liked Carrey’s performance, that kind of portrayal just wouldn’t translate well in a stage show, unless of course it was Jim himself doing the performing, which will not be the case here.

According to an article in TV Guide the preview will start on October 25th with the Broadway debut geared for the beginning of the holiday season beginning November 8, 2006.

Hey Sam -

Love the site and the updates. Wanted to throw some info your way.

Actor pals in NYC this past week went to auditions for Evil Dead the Musical…. yep seriously.

I guess the project has been around for a while. I know from other pals in the theatre business that they have reworked it some to focus on the first two films and only reference Army of Darkness. If you do a search on line for it you will see a ton of review and articles about the smaller productions around the country.

From what I have heard this current audition though is a larger Toronto production planned for this summer with a move to Off-Broadway in NYC in the fall.

Seemed right up Slice of Sci-Fi’s alley

I have included links I found to some of the smaller productions:

“Undead Can Dance” from the Montreal Mirror -

A blog that re-copied the casting notice written up on May 16th:

“What’s Good/What Blows in New York Theater” -

Chele