See two Broadway shows online this week, as part of the Broadway Cares mission to keep Broadway alive while theaters are shut down, and help support members of the theater community not earning a paycheck right now.
These shows feature Emmy and Academy Award winners and are FREE to watch online, but you are encouraged to donate to Broadway Cares.
Every dollar donated will help those in the theater community across the country who are affected by HIV/AIDS, COVID-19 and other critical illnesses with healthy meals, lifesaving medication, emergency financial assistance, housing, counseling and more.
It’s a worthy cause for anybody who loves live theater - which is all of us.
8 pm Eastern on Tuesday, January 26
Two-time Emmy Award winner Bobby Cannavale and Academy Award winner Marisa Tomei star in a streamed reading of Jon Robin Baitz’s lauded and deeply stirring play Three Hotels.
The special evening, which benefits Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, is produced by Tectonic Theater Project and directed by celebrated two-time Tony Award nominee Moisés Kaufman.
The free streamed reading, will include a special introduction by Baitz and Kaufman.
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The play is a deeply human story that unfolds through monologues set in hotel rooms in Morocco, the Virgin Islands and Mexico, as a married couple reflect on their lives as players in the game of international business. It’s described as a tour-de-force of humor, tragedy and penetrating insight.
The New York Times called it a “portrait of a love poisoned and shrunk by a corrupt business culture. … But with a precocious sense that the emotions that bind people and drive them apart are not easily parsed.” The Associated Press said, “Three Hotels packs an emotional punch that lingers.”
Cannavale was nominated for Tony Awards for his roles in Mauritius and The Motherf***er with the Hat, and was most recently seen on Broadway in The Lifespan of a Fact with Cherry Jones and Daniel Radcliffe. He received his Emmys for Boardwalk Empire and Will & Grace.
Tomei won the Oscar for her performance in My Cousin Vinny and was nominated for her roles in The Wrestler and In the Bedroom. She most recently was seen on Broadway in 2019 in The Rose Tattoo, her fifth appearance on the Great Bright Way.
Kaufman, who founded Tectonic Theater Project with his husband, Jeff LaHoste, is known for writing The Laramie Project about the cultural conflict surrounding the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard. On Broadway, he received Tony nominations for writing 33 Variations and directing I Am My Own Wife. He’s also directed Broadway’s The Heiress, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo and, most recently, Torch Song. He is a recipient of the National Medal of Arts from President Barack Obama.
Baitz is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist whose Other Desert Cities received a Tony nomination for Best Play. Among his other plays are A Fair Country, The Paris Letter, The Substance of Fire and Ten Unknowns. He also created the television series Brothers & Sisters and wrote the screenplay for the film Stonewall.
Tectonic Theater Project is a developmental theater company founded by Kaufman and based in New York City. For nearly 30 years the company has been dedicated to creating new and innovative works for the stage that rigorously explore theatrical language and form while fostering vibrant dialogues with audiences and radical empathy in the global community.
Where to watch: on Broadway Cares YouTube channel. It will be available through Saturday, January 30.
Donate here
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8 pm Eastern on Friday, January 29
The world premiere of the English-language performance of Anjou: The Musical Horror Tale, a haunting and modern Mexican opera, is set to benefit Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.
The cast features Taylor Iman Jones, Bianca Marroquín, Julia Murney and Kristie Dale Sanders as Catherine de’ Medici; Caroline Bowman, Shereen Pimentel and Eva Tavares as Margot de Valois; Javier Muñoz as Charles IX; Roberto Araujo, Jonathan Burke, Jay Armstrong Johnson, Jelani Remy and Adam Roberts as Henry; Austin Colby as Arthur; and Nathan Cockroft, Kevin Curtis, Gabriel Hyman and Michael Perrie Jr. as Spirit/Mignon. Marroquín will also serve as the narrator.
Performed in the style of a Broadway concept album, the actors will split roles throughout the musical.
The historically based show takes place as Charles IX is crowned as the new French monarch, the Catholic church puts pressure on Queen Catherine de’ Medici to eradicate Protestantism in France. The treacherous queen has a plan of her own: to remain in power through her beloved and overly conceited son, Henry of Anjou, and to plan her daughter’s wedding with a Protestant knight, while executing one of the bloodiest events in history.
A musical of sinister characters, dark secrets and passionate desires, Anjou: The Musical Horror Tale dwells on themes that are regrettably relevant to our times: the dangers of unfounded hatred and extreme intolerance.
Fusing Renaissance-inspired melodies, modern orchestrations and Latinx-influenced tunes, Anjou: The Musical Horror Tale turns a tragic moment in history into a riveting exploration of kindness and acceptance against a backdrop of injustice, prejudice and ruthless ambitions.
Anjou: The Musical Horror Tale has music by Guillermo Mendez M. and lyrics by Mendez and Guadalupe Sandoval, in a new English translation by Javier Vilalta. The show is directed and edited by Roberto Araujo. Grammy and Emmy Award winner John McDaniel will serve as music director.
Anjou: The Musical Horror Tale is produced by Araujo and Vilalta.
Where to watch: on Broadway Cares’ YouTube channel and also on Playbill.com
Donate here
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