GOOD MORNING BROADWAY FANS! It’s getting closer to that time of year again. Broadway’s Biggest night is only 12 days away and we at New York Broadway Tours are continuing our Top 30 Tony Awards countdown playing you the best Musical Theatre performances from the past telecasts.
At #12 today is well known as a TALE AS OLD AS TIME. This is of course the great classic story of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. It was written by Alan Menken (Music), Time Rice (Lyrics), the late Howard Ashman (Lyrics), and Linda Woolverton (Book).
From the 1994 telecast, Tony nominees Susan Egan, Terrence Mann, Burke Moses, Gary Beach, and cast members perform a medley of scenes and songs from the show.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (which was Disney’s first ever attempt at Broadway and based on the beloved Oscar winning animated film) premiered in 1994 at Broadway’s Palace Theatre and later transferred to the Lunt Fontanne Theatre where it played a total of 5,507 performances. It was nominated for 9 Tonys that year, winning only 1 for Best Costume Design for Ann Hould-Ward. It’s currently the 9th Longest Running Show in Broadway History and is currently still being performed on tour across America as well as productions (schools, community theatres, regional theatres, and more) around the world. Coming up March 17th, 2017, Disney will release it’s all new LIVE ACTION remake of the musical featuring an all star cast. It will feature all the songs we loved from the Animated film plus some new songs from Alan Menken and Tim Rice written especially for the live action remake. Sadly, it will not feature Menken and Rice’s songs that were written for the stage version.
FUN FACT: During the Broadway run when Grammy Award winner Toni Braxton was playing the role of Belle, Alan Menken and Tim Rice wrote an additional song for the show especially for her entitled A CHANGE IN ME. In addition, when Ashley Brown made her Broadway Debut as the 15th Actress ever to play Belle after having sung the song on the National Tour of the the shorten lived Disney revue ON THE RECORD, the ending was changes to more a higher belt and grander orchestrations. Because it fit so well with the story, the song is still in all productions today.
Isn’t this musical timeless?!
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