| Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | Official_Press_Release 04:53 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| VANESSA HUDGENS TO STAR IN THE TITLE ROLE OF THE NEW BROADWAY PRODUCTION OF ALAN JAY LERNER and FREDERICK LOEWE’s GIGI PRE-BROADWAY ENGAGEMENT AT THE JOHN F. KENNEDY CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS IN WASHINGTON, D.C., JANUARY 16-FEBRUARY 12, 2015 AT THE EISENHOWER THEATER RE-ENVISIONED PRODUCTION ADAPTED BY HEIDI THOMAS CHOREOGRAPHY BY JOSHUA BERGASSE DIRECTED BY ERIC SCHAEFFER Vanessa Hudgens will play the title role in the new Broadway production of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe’s beloved Oscar and Tony Award-winning film and stage musical, GIGI. GIGI will be directed by Eric Schaeffer (Follies, Million Dollar Quartet), in a re-envisioned adaptation by British playwright and BAFTA-winning and Emmy-nominated screenwriter Heidi Thomas (“Call the Midwife,” “Cranford,” “Upstairs, Downstairs”). Joshua Bergasse (On the Town, “Smash”) will choreograph the production. GIGI will play a pre-Broadway engagement in the Eisenhower Theater at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (David M. Rubenstein, chairman, Deborah F. Rutter, president) in Washington, D.C. from January 16-February 12, 2015. Opening night is January 29, 2015. Tickets will go on sale on Monday, September 22 at 10:00 AM to Kennedy Center Members and on Wednesday, October 1 at 10:00 AM to the general public. Visit www.kennedy-center.org for further details. GIGI will open on Broadway in 2015 following the Kennedy Center engagement. Hudgens played the role of Gigi in recent readings in New York City. “From the moment we met Vanessa, we knew we found our Gigi,” director Schaeffer commented. “She is smart, gorgeous, a wonderful singer and is so luminous on stage. You cannot take your eyes off of her.” “I started performing in musicals from a young age, and it has always been my dream to be on Broadway,” Hudgens said. “I cannot wait to get back on stage, singing and dancing these songs and living in GIGI’s glamorous world.” “I have been living with Colette’s feisty, elegant, feline Gigi in my imagination for a long time now - and in Vanessa Hudgens, she is finally made flesh,” said Heidi Thomas, who has written the book adaptation. “We absolutely fell in love with Vanessa and we know that audiences will too,” said producer Jenna Segal. “She has a huge worldwide following, and it’s easy to understand why, once you see her on stage. She just has that special something, and we’re thrilled to have her with us to bring our new GIGI to life.” A California native, Vanessa Hudgens began her career in musical theatre at the age of eight, performing in productions of Evita, Carousel, The Wizard of Oz, The King & I, The Music Man, Cinderella and Damn Yankees. She made her feature film debut in Catherine Hardwick’s Thirteen, starring Holly Hunter and Evan Rachel Wood, and co-starred in the action film, Thunderbirds. She is best known for her role as Gabriella Montez in Disney Channel’s breakaway hit, “High School Musical” and its follow up films, “High School Musical 2” and the theatrical release, High School Musical 3: Senior Year. She followed her “High School Musical” success with the critically acclaimed Bandslam, as well as Beastly and Journey 2: The Mysterious Island. Recent credits include Frozen Ground, directed by Scott Walker, Spring Breakers, opposite James Franco and Selena Gomez and directed by Harmony Korine, and Gimme Shelter, directed by Ron Krauss. In 2010, she won the ShoWest Award for “Female Star of Tomorrow” and the Trendsetter Award at the 2014 Young Hollywood Awards. Additional casting and creative team will be announced in coming weeks. Based on the 1944 novel by Colette, GIGI was first adapted for the Broadway stage in 1951 by Anita Loos, with an unknown Audrey Hepburn in the title role; then, following their success with My Fair Lady, the team of Alan Jay Lerner (screenplay and lyrics) and Frederick Loewe (music) adapted the material for the 1958 movie musical, winner of nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The film, directed by Vincente Minnelli, is widely considered the last great MGM movie musical, and is beloved for its wit, charm and sumptuous costume and production design. GIGI includes such numbers as “Thank Heaven for Little Girls,” “I Remember It Well” “The Night They Invented Champagne” and the Oscar-winning title song, “Gigi”. GIGI also won the Tony Award for Best Score in 1974. This new adaptation of GIGI will feature the songs from the movie, including “The Parisians” and “Say a Prayer for Me Tonight,” which were dropped from the previous stage version, as well as four songs written and added to the score by Lerner and Loewe in 1973, “Paris is Paris Again,” “I Never Want to Go Home Again,” “The Contract,” and “In This Wide, Wide World.” GIGI is produced by Jenna Segal. General management is by Foresight Theatrical. # # # # For more information, visit www.GigiOnBroadway.com | |
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| re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | WaymanWong 10:09 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
| In reply to: | Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - Official_Press_Release 04:53 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| 1. I'm happy to hear that they're restoring ''The Parisians.'' But will it take the place of ''The Earth and Other Minor Things''? And I'm glad that ''Say a Prayer for Me Tonight'' is coming back; it's better than ''In This Wide, Wide World'' (which should be cut, but apparently they're keeping it, too). 2. I've never seen ''Gigi'' onstage. What is ''I Never Want to Go Home Again''? And why wasn't it on the cast album? 3. Anyone heard who else is cast? A summer reading included Victoria Clark, Corey Cott and Howard McGillin. | |
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| re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 10:38 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - WaymanWong 10:09 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| I quite like "In This Wide, Wide World," which occurs later in the show than "Say a Prayer for Me Tonight," so there's no reason they can't both be in the show. I also like "The Earth and Other Minor Things" fairly well, though the lyric is pretty anonymous and could be sung by anyone. With three ballads Gigi might begin to seem a rather droopy girl rather than a spirited one. So it's good that they're also including "The Parisians." The added number I can really do without "Paris Is Paris Again." "Thrillingly, killingly," "Spicily, vicely," oy. Alfred Drake really deserved something better. "I Never Want to Go Home Again" is a number sung at the beach by Gigi and the chorus. The melody can be heard in the overture. The surmise I've heard is that it was left off the cast recording because it was the only number for which the chorus was required. Not recording it considerably cut down the costs of making the recording. I guess by that point RCA realized they were going to lose most or all the money they had invested in the venture. Overall, this project makes me feel, "Oh, God, why?" | |
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| re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | LegitOnce 07:57 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
| In reply to: | Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - Official_Press_Release 04:53 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| I only regret this has happened too late for Elaine Stritch to play Madame Alvarez. "You lost a glove." "I LOST A GODDAMNED COMB!" | |
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| re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | CamMacFan 07:54 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
| In reply to: | Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - Official_Press_Release 04:53 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| I sincerely hope she has made improvements in her acting talent. I saw her as Mimi when The Hollywood Bowl produced Rent. On both nights, people around me laughed during her serious moments. When she sang the line, "I'm going back, back to school," the person behind me said "I hope it's an acting school." It wasn't loud but loud enough that it started a chain reaction and four or five rows were laughing for a bit. | |
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| re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI | |
| Posted by: | sf 12:04 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - CamMacFan 07:54 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| I saw her in "Rent" too. Yes, people laughed. Justifiably, she was terrible. | |
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| thats pretty good | |
| Posted by: | dramedy 11:02 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Vanessa Hudgens to Star in New Broadway Production of GIGI - CamMacFan 07:54 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| I usually dont like to encourage such remarks, but I had to laugh when lestat's last line is im lastat and I will live forever. The guy in front of me said "just not on broadway" | |
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| My favorite .... | |
| Posted by: | jdm 04:48 am EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | thats pretty good - dramedy 11:02 pm EDT 09/10/14 |
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| remark like that was a play long ago, The End of the World (or something like that) starring John Shea and Linda Hunt. It had to be one of the worst things I ever sat through. At one point the Linda Hunt character says "this is just awful" and a guy shouts out "it sure is!" I felt sorry for the cast, but that produced spasms of laughter from the audience and was the only entertaining moment that evening. Jim | |
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| the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | Chazwaza 05:04 am EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | My favorite .... - jdm 04:48 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| I believe it was at a play called Saturn Returns, or Saturn Rising, something like that, at the Mitzi Newhouse about 5 years ago. The theater is very small and you could hear anything if someone said it... in the most dramatic and intense part of the play, an elderly man whose seat was facing where the action in this scene was, he just says out loud to the actress, who is 5 feet from him, "you're a lousy actress." (I think he was wrong) | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | StageLover 07:54 am EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | the worst I've ever heard... - Chazwaza 05:04 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| I think the same woman showed up at the Beaumont(maybe an LCT member!) who waited for a quite moment near the end to announce, "I don't like this show!". | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | MikeR 11:20 am EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - StageLover 07:54 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| At a regional theater local to me, in a production of Wendy Wasserstein's Old Money... During a quiet moment in act 2, an older woman in the front row turned to (who I presume was) her husband and said "THIS IS TEDIOUS." They were both wearing infrared hearing devices, so she spoke quite loudly - no way she wasn't heard by everyone in the relatively small (425 seat) space. Including everyone on stage, of course. | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | PatrickHSF 04:17 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - MikeR 11:20 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| I recently heard about this guy named Shia who was attending a performance of Cabaret . . . ;-) | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | Chazwaza 03:06 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - MikeR 11:20 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| That's sadly not uncommon, old people who don't know or care how loud they are being if making a comment to their companion. But what was so incredibly bad about the man I mentioned was he was speaking directly to the actress, not to a companion. | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | NightMusic77 12:58 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - MikeR 11:20 am EDT 09/11/14 |
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| The worst (best?) audience participation I've ever heard of was during a performance of Cabaret on Broadway in the late 90s. At the end of Act I, an older woman stood up and yelled "LIES! ALL LIES!" in a thick German accent and left the theater. | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:18 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - NightMusic77 12:58 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
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| FWIW, I'd have been interested in hearing her specific objections. "Lies" is a very vague comment. | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | LegitOnce 02:06 am EDT 09/13/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - AlanScott 03:18 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
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| "Zere iss NO VAY Alan Cumming is a homosexual!" | |
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| re: the worst I've ever heard... | |
| Posted by: | Alcindoro 02:35 pm EDT 09/14/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - LegitOnce 02:06 am EDT 09/13/14 |
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| Wouldn't Liberace have made a great Emcee in CABARET?? | |
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| Whoa, that's scary... | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 01:50 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | re: the worst I've ever heard... - NightMusic77 12:58 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
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| Didn't she have any notion what that show was about? Laura | |
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| re: Whoa, that's scary... | |
| Posted by: | NightMusic77 02:42 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
| In reply to: | Whoa, that's scary... - showtunetrivia 01:50 pm EDT 09/11/14 |
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| apparently not! | |
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