Issue #224: March 1, 2009

• The date is set for the premiere of Spider-Man, Turn Off the Dark, a musical directed by Julie Taymor (Lion King) with songs by U2’s Bono and The Edge. The curtain rises at the Hilton Theater on January 16, 2010.

• Hamilton , Ontario native Caissie Levy steps into the lead role in the upcoming revival of Hair which opens at the Al Hirschfeld Theater on March 31.

• Oscar nominee Anne Hathaway joins the Public Theater’s summer presentation of Twelfth Night. Performances will begin on June 9.

• David Mirvish recently announced the 2009-10 season in Toronto with a roster of old and new. Revivals of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat and Fiddler on the Roof will be part of the season. The Fiddler revival stars original Tevye, Chaim Topol and is billed as the farewell tour. Other productions include the new musicals Priscilla Queen of the Desert; Little House on the Prairie (based on the stories of Laura Ingalls Wilder); Mel Brook’s latest offering Young Frankenstein and The Harder They Come based on the film that made reggae star Jimmy Cliff a household name.

• On other Toronto news the long running Dirty Dancing will have its final performance on March 29 when it will have played 582 performances at the Royal Alexandra. The musical opened on November 15, 2007 playing to more than 800,000 people.

• In LA Julia Stiles and Bill Pullman will appear at the Mark Taper Forum in a revival of Oleanna on June 5.

• He was a poet, a children’s television producer, a ghost writer and a columnist but what Eric Blau will be most remembered for is that little Off Broadway musical Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. He, along with composer Mort Shuman, translated the Belgian-born songwriter’s work and spun it into a memorable evening of musical theater that is often revived on stages around the world. Blau died on February 17 at the age of 87.