The Myth of “The Broadway Voice”

By Robert Weinert-Kendt

With permission from the blog The Wicked Stage

Charles Isherwood has penned a seemingly plausible bit of AllThatChat bait lamenting a supposed trend of non-singing celebrities in Broadway musicals, but his examples–the current How To Succeed in Business, last season’s A Little Night Music, the recent stunt-cast concert staging

Sam Levene and Vivian Blaine in the original Guys and Dolls

of Company–not only strike me as weak examples of an incipient trend, the whole lament itself is ahistorical. While he concedes such infamous instances of Broadway non-singing as Lauren Bacall and Kate Hepburn, and mentions that My Fair Lady was built around Rex Harrison’s sprechstimme, the examples are in fact much more plentiful.
Zeta-Jones’ Desiree, for instance, which I’ll agree was no great shakes–but it shouldn’t be forgotten that the original Desiree, Glynis Johns, had such limited range and breath that Sondheim specifically wrote her big ballad, “Send in the Clowns,” in short phrases. Sam Levene, the original Nathan Detroit, was so tone-deaf that Frank Loesser had to write a number introducing the character in which everyone but Nathan sings (“The Oldest Established”), and for the one song Nathan does sing, “Sue Me,” Loesser generously included a series of lead-in notes (“Call a lawyer and…”) so Levene could work up to the pitch on the downbeat. Kurt Weill wrote the standard “September Song” for that great operatic baritone Walter Huston. Cy Coleman, the one time I interviewed him, recounted that his first musical was the Lucille Ball vehicle Wildcat; Ball, he said, “had a range of five notes. Then my reward was Little Me, for Sid Caesar–who had a range of four notes.”

And need I mention Fred Astaire–a great song interpreter, in fact, but with just about as thin a voice as could be brought to the task?

(continued….)

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Involved in Local Theater?
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If you’re involved in local theater, Zenergo.com can be a great place to organize, manage, recruit, and market your theater program!

Join Zenergo.com — it’s free, and it’s easy — then create a Group representing your upcoming Play. (Or create a Group for your theater company, with a SubGroup for each Play in your program.)

With the Group/SubGroup you can manage actors and support staff, maintain and share calendars for each play, and save pictures and documents, making it easier to manage the process as you move towards opening night for each play.

Set up an Event for each Play, set it to Public, and use that to market your play into the Zenergo community in your area.

Everything is in one place, focussed on your group and event. Best of all, you don’t need to be a Web master–Zenergo is easy to manage! And — did we mention this? — it’s free!
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The bottom line is that the American musical theater, though often treated with concert-hall reverence, has always been a thing of mottled, mongrel glory. For every Julie Andrews or Ethel Merman or Howard Keel, there has always been a Zero Mostel, a Jack Klugman, an Elaine Stritch. The great songbook is full of standards that were first introduced, and tailored to the talents of, opera singers, clowns, faded vaudevilleans, Hollywood stars trying their hand at Broadway (cf. much of the score of Follies). Admittedly, this last category may have proliferated in recent years, in both musicals and straight plays, but judging by the evidence of musicals currently on Broadway–fromAnything Goes to Book of Mormon–the pipes are all right.

ABOUT Rob Weinert-Kendt

Associate Editor at American Theatre magazine. He has written features and criticism for The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Variety, Newsday, Village Voice, Time Out NY, The Guardian, and The San Francisco Chronicle, among others. He was the founding editor of ‘Back Stage West’.

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Me? Invest in a Broadway Show?!?

By Ken Davenport 
Broadway Producer

I’ve gotten a lot of questions from readers all over the world expressing interest in investing in a Broadway or an Off-Broadway show.

Usually they are unsure about how to get involved and, more importantly, they want to know how to pick their first show.

Since this seemed to be such a hot topic, I thought I’d take a couple of blogs to dispel a few of the nasty rumors associated with investing in Broadway or Off-Broadway shows, and also give you my checklist of how to choose a show to invest in.

Today, we’ll deal with the rumors. Tomorrow, the checklist.

BROADWAY INVESTMENT RUMOR #1: Investing in Broadway shows is only for the super-rich.

Because Broadway capitalizations can range from $2 million for a play up to $20 million for a Broadway Mega-Musical, many people fear that the “entry point,” or the amount of money required for an initial individual investment, must be astronomically high.

Not true.

While the average smaller investment in a big Broadway show is probably about $25,000, I have seen many shows where investors were able to get in for as little as $10,000, and even a few where the entry point was only $5,000! There are a lot of publicly traded mutual funds that don’t allow you to get in at that level. These lower investment thresholds are very common in the Off-Broadway arena.

What determines the lowest investment level? Here’s how it works. Capitalizations are divided into ‘units’, just like shares of a stock. What defines a unit is up to the Producer. Some Producers like to have a round 100 units per show, regardless of the capitalization. Some like to pick the lowest amount they can accept as an investment. Some shows are limited in the number of investors they can have. Some producers just make it up arbitrarily.

Here’s a tip. If you’re considering a show, and you get sticker shock when you hear the price of one unit, ask for a “partial.” Splitting units ain’t like splitting an atom. It can be done with ease. Depending upon a variety of circumstances, including how hot the property is, who the producer is, and whether or not other investors took “round units,” it may be possible for you to invest in a smaller amount than the “ask.”

The key is, of course, never to be pressured into investing more than you’re willing to lose. If the entry point on one project is too high, don’t worry — there are others.

BROADWAY INVESTMENT RUMOR #2: Investing in Broadway shows is only for the super-crazy.

So many people think that it’s bonkers to get involved with Broadway.

The fact is, if you’re an individual of a certain net worth, your traditional financial advisor will probably recommend that you allocate a certain amount of your investment portfolio (usually about 10%) to higher-risk instruments, or so-called Alternative Investments, in order to diversify yourself (most Broadway and other AIs require investors to be “Accredited,” as having a certain net worth, although this is not always the case for shows). Look at the Smith Barney site here to see a description of the Alternative approach.

Why would Broadway, with its high risk but potentially high return, be excluded from that list? In fact, it isn’t. Check out the Wikipedia entry for Alternative Investments here. Recognize anything?

Alternative Investments, including Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, are high risk, without a doubt.

The commonly quoted statistic is that only one out of five Broadway shows recoup their investment (that ratio is even lower for Off-Broadway shows). But it’s not the only high risk instrument on the market, by any means. Investing in Broadway shows is a lot like investing in a restaurant, a piece of art or, frankly, in any entreprenurial start-up. Look at this statistic that puts the success rate of start-ups at the exact same percentage as I just quoted above — 20%! See, it’s not as bad as we thought.

And if you do proper due diligence, as we’ll discuss in Part II, you can increase those odds in your favor.

With big risk can come big rewards. Even if you do end up performing according to the stats, the goal and hope is that the one show out of five ends up paying for previous losses and then some. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Imagine what it would have been like to invest in Annie, or West Side Story, or Cats, or Wicked.

BROADWAY INVESTMENT RUMOR #3: Investors in Broadway shows belong to an exclusive “club” that doesn’t accept new members.

While it is true that there are a lot of investors in the Broadway world who have been in the circle for a long time, it’s not as closed-door a club as you think. While it can be hard for a new investor to get in on the hottest shows coming to town, it’s not impossible, and sometimes producers will let you get in on a ‘sure-thing’ (which doesn’t exist, by the way) if you also agree to come into something a bit more risky.

However, it is a relationship business, and preferential treatment is often given to investors who have been doing it longer, and to those that have been faithful to the producer.

So what does a new investor do?

Start the relationship.

Call a Producer. Email them. Fax them. Simply state that you’re looking to invest in a specific show (if you know one that they are about to do), or ask to be put on the list to be called about their next show. It’s not a commitment for either party, and I don’t know any producer out there who would mind putting you on a “potential” list. Just make sure you are serious about your interest.

Those are three of the biggest obstacles potential Broadway and Off-Broadway investors tell me prevent them from taking the first step and joining the ranks of Broadway investors. In Part II, we’ll talk about just how you choose a project to invest in, once you’ve decided that investing in Broadway is something you definitely want to do.

If you are interested in learning more about investing in Broadway shows, visit my site, Davenport Theatrical Productions. here.

 

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This article is adapted from Ken Davenport’s blog at http://www.theproducersperspective.com/my_weblog/2009/04/how-to-invest-in-a-broadway-show-part-i.html .

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Involved in Local Theater?
Zenergo Can Help!

If you’re involved in local theater, Zenergo.com can be a great place to organize, manage, recruit, and market your theater program!

Join Zenergo.com — it’s free, and it’s easy — then create a Group representing your upcoming Play. (Or create a Group for your theater company, with a SubGroup for each Play in your program.)

With the Group/SubGroup you can manage actors and support staff, maintain and share calendars for each play, and save pictures and documents, making it easier to manage the process as you move towards opening night for each play.

Set up an Event for each Play, set it to Public, and use that to market your play into the Zenergo community in your area.

Everything is in one place, focussed on your group and event. Best of all, you don’t need to be a Web master–Zenergo is easy to manage! And — did we mention this? — it’s free!
                      ==============================

About Ken Davenport 

Ken Davenport is a Broadway and Off-Broadway producer. Recent Broadway productions include Oleanna starring Bill Pullman and Julia Stiles, Speed-the-Plow starring Raul Esparza, Will Ferrell’s You’re Welcome America, Blithe Spirit starring Angela Lansbury, and 13. Ken is the only independent producer to have had three shows running simultaneously Off-Broadway — Altar Boyz, The Awesome 80s Prom and My First Time. He was recently featured on a national commercial for Apple’s iPhone, named one of Crain’s “Forty Under 40” in 2008, and was dubbed the “P.T. Barnum of Off-Broadway” by The New York Times. He has written articles for Forbes,Mashable, Imedia and others. He blogs about theater at “The Producer’s Perspective–A Broadway Producer’s Perspective on Everything Broadway and Beyond”.