Goodspeed Takes a ‘Holiday’ on Broadway
You can understand the feelings from the folks at Goodspeed Musicals of being a tad overlooked. After all, the theater buzz of the last few years has been surrounding Hartford Stage’s A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder, which won a Tony Award a few seasons back for outstanding new musical, and its upcoming musical Anastasia, which opens in April on Broadway.
Goodspeed, however, points out that it has sent 20 musical revivals and new productions to Broadway (and others off-Broadway and to regional theaters across the country) over the decades, including the mega-hit Annie in the mid-’70s.
Though it’s been quite a few years since it had a hit there, Goodspeed is now back on Broadway with its 21st transferred show with Holiday Inn, which opened earlier this month under the Roundabout Theatre Company banner at Studio 54, the fabled site of disco and decadence in the ’70s and now a legit house for theater.
The production, loosely based on the 1942 film starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, will be familiar to those who saw the East Haddam production two years ago, except that virtually every one of the cast members are new. But the look, shape, story and Irving Berlin songs, for the most part, are the same as what was crafted at the Opera House. The size of the cast, orchestra, and some song switcheroos—as well as even more glam production values—mark the new version.