Broadway Friday

- Meta-musical [title of show] begins previews at the Lyceum on July 5th, with the opening set for July 17th. The entire original Off Broadway cast will appear.

- Off Broadway: Experimental art group 3 Legged Dog will present the world premiere of Charles Mee's Fire Island at the 3LD Art & Technology Center in the West Village beginning April 10th. "Characters include drag queens, 6-foot tall little girls, freak clowns, Japanese bondage junkies, old folks and 50 other more typical island inhabitants, all dealing with various stages of their relationships." The show consists of "an extremely wide format HD video work, a large scale panoramic multimedia installation/performance with 3-dimensional video and spatial sound as well as an ongoing interactive web component. A giant rear projection screen will show multiple perspectives, collaged into one giant array of imagery." I will definitely will check this out and report back.

- Richard Thomas, the composer and co-writer of Jerry Springer: The Opera, is working on a similar treatment of Anna Nicole Smith. The show will debut at London's Royal Opera House with a 90-piece orchestra.

- Tony winner Mandy Patinkin will perform Mandy Patinkin on Broadway on Monday, May 19 at 8pm at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre as a benefit for Classic Stage Company.

- Due to rave reviews, Lincoln Center Theatre's production of South Pacific has been granted open-run status with tickets now on sale through January 2009. The Rodgers and Hammerstein classic stars Kelli O'Hara as Nellie Forbush, Paulo Szot as Emile deBecque, Loretta Ables Sayre as Bloody Mary, Matthew Morrison as Lieutenant Joe Cable, and Danny Burstein as Luther Billis.