There is no question that Sydnie Christmas can sing.

That was never really the issue Sunday night at Sony Hall. The winner of Britain’s Got Talent possesses a formidable instrument, charisma, an enormous belt, considerable control and, perhaps most importantly, the instinct not to use all of that power all of the time. At her best, Christmas will release a thrilling wall of sound and then suddenly pull the voice back, allowing something warmer and more vulnerable to emerge. It is a beautiful choice because it tells us she understands that volume and emotion are not the same thing.

The frustrating thing about her Sony Hall concert was how often the evening prevented us from hearing precisely what makes her special. Thankfully my video’s allow you to hear much better than being at the venue.

Christmas is enormously likable. She has an unaffected warmth with an audience and none of the distancing polish that sometimes arrives when a singer becomes famous very quickly. Her audience clearly adores her, and Sunday night’s crowd was firmly in her corner from the moment she appeared.

Smartly, she included “Tomorrow,” “My Way” and “Over the Rainbow”  the songs that introduced her to the world on Britain’s Got Talent. Those performances remain important because they reveal what first made people stop and listen. Christmas didn’t win simply because she could produce spectacular notes. There was an emotional immediacy to her singing that made familiar material suddenly feel personal and she made iconic songs hers.

From Christmas’s concert it seems she intends to move into musical theatre—and she made that ambition clear—this concert however raised some questions about how she is positioning herself for that next chapter. Her rendition of “Don’t Rain On My Parade” made me instantly want to see her do Funny Girl.

Most surprisingly, she did not perform “Animal Lover” from her role as Cruella de Vil in 101 Dalmatians The Musical. Thankfully PBS will be presenting Sydnie Christmas: Live in London where the song will be sung. For a singer actively interested in establishing herself within musical theatre, omitting material that already connects her directly to the form seemed a curious decision. A concert isn’t simply a collection of songs; it is an opportunity to tell an audience, and perhaps an industry, who you are and where you intend to go next.

Some of the musical-theatre choices she made were less successful. “Maybe This Time” from Cabaret should seemingly be ideal territory for Christmas. It requires enormous vocal ability, but the song is not really about singing enormously. Sally Bowles is trying to convince herself that perhaps, against all available evidence, life will finally choose her. The song needs hope, desperation and the terrible possibility that Sally herself doesn’t quite believe what she’s singing. Christmas sang it impressively, and her audience loved it. Christmas has the instrument; what she now needs to explore is how thoroughly that instrument can disappear inside somebody else’s life, which is normally her forte.

Dez Duron and Sydnie Christmas

During a duet with Dez Duron from Maybe Happy Ending. Unexpectedly, he emerged more strongly from the number. Not because Christmas suddenly lacked vocal ability, but because musical theatre operates under different rules from a concert. The best singer doesn’t necessarily win the scene. Given the raw material she possesses, watching her develop could be extremely exciting.

Unfortunately, another obstacle Sunday night had nothing whatsoever to do with her. The band was too loud. They were amazing, especially the drummer but in a room as cavernous as Sony Hall with concert goers talking and food being eaten and delivered there were times the intimacy of her voice was swallowed up.

That matters enormously with a singer like Christmas because one of her greatest strengths is dynamic contrast. She can produce that tremendous belt and then retreat into something much more delicate. When the orchestration overwhelms the quieter passages, the effect can make the voice appear inconsistent when the singer is actually making an intelligent musical choice.

You should never have to strain to hear Sydnie Christmas. Sony Hall itself is the wrong room. Sony Hall can be terrific for the right performer, but Christmas’s particular appeal requires intimacy. Her personality invites an audience toward her rather than projecting an enormous theatrical persona across a cavernous space. She needs a room that allows silence to become part of the performance.

Put her at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Put her in a small Broadway theatre. Put her in The Carlyle. Put her at Carnegie Hall. Put her in Town Hall. Give her an acoustically sophisticated room where the audience can hear the moment that massive voice becomes almost a whisper.

The Sony Hall environment worked against precisely the qualities that distinguish her from dozens of other powerhouse vocalists.

Christmas also performed two original songs she wrote from her album The Artist, which  is scheduled for release on October 2nd. They are perfectly respectable songs, and she sings them extremely well, but stylistically they feel strangely displaced—as though they wandered out of the late 1980s or early 1990s and never entirely discovered that popular music had moved on. That creates another problem. Christmas’s voice may be more contemporary than her material. However she did a soul/disco set that was remarkable and I personally would love to see her do a retro album of that genre.

This is where Christmas now faces the wonderful—and dangerous—problem that confronts enormously gifted singers after their initial breakthrough. What do you do with the gift? She has already proved that she can sing. Repeatedly. She doesn’t need another evening designed to prove how high, how loudly or how spectacularly she can belt. We know. What she needs now is material worthy of the voice and a director—or musical director—willing to be ruthless about choosing it. She needs arrangements that leave room around her. She needs a venue that understands intimacy. If musical theatre is genuinely where she wants to go, she needs to move beyond singing songs beautifully and begin allowing characters to take possession of that extraordinary instrument, because the potential is absolutely there.

Sunday night didn’t diminish my opinion of Sydnie Christmas’s talent. If anything, it clarified it. She is better than the concert built around her.

That may sound like criticism. For an artist still deciding exactly who she intends to become, it may actually be the most encouraging thing one can say.

Broadway packed a weekend bag, left Times Square behind and headed north. On Friday, August 14, the inaugural The Festival opened at Hutton Brickyards Riverfront Hotel + Venue in Kingston, New York, transforming the Hudson River waterfront into something Broadway has rarely attempted: a true destination festival built around the people, music and community of the theatre.

Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Produced by Joshua Saltman and David B. Schwartz, The Festival ultimately drew 2,875 attendees from 48 states over its three-day debut, with 165 performers taking part in more than 30 programs. There were 30 musicians, 14 ensemble members and 13 apprentices, but numbers only begin to describe the ambition of what Saltman and Schwartz were attempting. This wasn’t Broadway presenting another concert. It was Broadway borrowing the language of the great music festivals and asking what happens when musical theatre gets out of the theatre.

Campfire Stage photo by Austin Ruffer

The answer, at least on Friday, was that it rather liked the fresh air. At the center of the sprawling weekend was the Broadway Direct Stage, an open-air covered venue surrounded by the Hudson Valley landscape. Instead of velvet seats, chandeliers and the compressed electricity of a Broadway house, audiences found themselves experiencing some of the theatre world’s most recognizable voices against water, sky and the industrial remnants of the historic brickyards. There was something wonderfully incongruous about it: Broadway glamour meeting Hudson Valley earthiness without either having to apologize to the other. The opening day’s lineup immediately established that this wasn’t going to be a modest experiment.

Gianmarco Soresi. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Gianmarco Soresi. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Comedian and actor Gianmarco Soresi hosted the inaugural “The Festival”(The Broadway Festival). He served as the host and emcee

Alex Newell. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Alex Newell. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Alex Newell. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Alex Newell

Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Mandy Gonzalez

Christopher Jackson. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Christopher Jackson and Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Christopher Jackson and Mandy Gonzalez. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Christopher Jackson

Javier Muñoz. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Christopher Jackson and Javier Muñoz. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Javier Muñoz

Solea Pfeiffer. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Solea Pfeiffer. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Solea Pfeiffer

Jasmine Amy Rogers. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Jasmine Amy Rogers. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Jasmine Amy Rogers. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Jasmine Amy Rogers

Cara Rose DiPietro. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Cara Rose DiPietro

Tyler Joseph Ellis. Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

Tyler Joseph Ellis and Matt Rodin were among the artists helping launch the weekend, while SiriusXM’s Seth Rudetsky did what Rudetsky does particularly well—turn Broadway history, personalities and musical obsession into entertainment.

Tommy Bracco Photo by Michaelah Reynolds

One of Friday’s most charming ideas belonged to Tommy Bracco, the Newsies alum and Big Brother favorite, who hosted a celebration of Disney music. Bracco began with “Out There” from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, but it was Solea Pfeiffer who provided one of the afternoon’s genuine reminders of how much extraordinary music remains trapped inside Disney’s animated catalogue. Her performances of “Colors of the Wind” from Pocahontas and “Reflection” from Mulan made a fairly persuasive argument for why Broadway has yet to get its hands on either score.

Reeve Carney and Eva Noblezada. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Eva Noblezada. Photo by Austin Ruffer

Then came Reeve Carney and Eva Noblezada, whose musical and personal history has become its own little piece of contemporary Broadway mythology. They originated Orpheus and Eurydice together in Hadestown, fell in love, married, and have continued sharing stages since. At Hutton Brickyards, the scale shifted. Away from the machinery of a Broadway production, the two were able to offer something more intimate—a reminder that before scenery, costumes and theatrical spectacle arrive, musical theatre begins with people telling stories through music.

Campfire Stage 2 photo by Austin Ruffer

That intimacy was one of the more intriguing elements of The Festival’s concept. Broadway normally asks audiences to enter its buildings. Here, Broadway entered the audience’s world. People wandered between performances, conversations and events rather than sitting obediently in one seat for two and a half hours. Artists who normally disappear through stage doors after a performance were suddenly part of a larger weekend community.

By evening, however, subtlety was finished.

The Big Show. Photo by Austin Ruffer

The Big Show. Photo by Austin Ruffer

The Big Show Night 1 Company photo by Austin Ruffer

Friday culminated with The Big Show, and the Broadway Direct Stage became exactly what its name promised: a full-scale concert designed to let Broadway voices loose. Cara Rose DiPietro, Tess Soltau and original Rent star Adam Pascal opened with an inspired piece of theatrical mischief, turning Stephen Sondheim’s “A Weekend in the Country” into a self-referential welcome to the weekend, accompanied by more than a dozen Broadway dancers.

It was an appropriate choice. Sondheim’s number is itself about people converging upon a destination carrying expectations, desires and complications with them. Here came thousands of Broadway devotees doing essentially the same thing, only their weekend in the country involved considerably more belting.

And that may be the cleverest thing about The Festival. Broadway has spent decades trying to expand beyond the geographic boundaries of Broadway while still treating the Broadway theatre as the center of the universe. Touring companies travel. Cast albums travel. Stars perform concerts. BroadwayCon created its own gathering place for fans. But the great American music-festival model—travel somewhere beautiful, stay for several days and immerse yourself in the music and the people who make it—has largely belonged to other genres.

Saltman and Schwartz decided musical theatre deserved one too.

They assembled an astonishing inaugural roster across the weekend: Audra McDonald, Kelli O’Hara, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Norbert Leo Butz, Jason Robert Brown, Lena Hall, Tom Kitt, Andrea McArdle, Alex Newell, Adam Pascal, Anthony Rapp, Jenn Colella, Andrew Barth Feldman, Lauren Patten, Denée Benton and many more, culminating in something irresistible to Broadway devotees—a 30th anniversary reunion of the original Broadway cast of Rent.

Behind that amount of talent was an equally formidable creative operation. Tony winner Jerry Mitchell and Jon Rua choreographed the event, with Mitchell and D.B. Bonds directing. Dan Lipton handled musical supervision, Julie McBride served as musical director, and Michael Downs oversaw creative direction and experience design. David Rees provided lighting, Cody Spencer sound, Caite Hevner video and Ryan Park costumes, while Lana Schwartz directed The Festival Apprentices. Chris Gratton served as production manager, technical director and site manager, with Lisa Iacucci as production supervisor.

That is an enormous amount of Broadway infrastructure to transport to the banks of the Hudson, and Friday proved that the concept could actually work.

By the time the weekend ended Sunday, Saltman and Schwartz were already prepared to announce that The Festival will return in 2027.

“We are absolutely thrilled with how The Festival went this weekend,” the producers said following its conclusion, thanking both the fans who had created the weekend’s community and the artists who had filled it. “We couldn’t be prouder of the experience and the incredible team that put it all together. We can’t wait to see you in 2027!”

Neither, apparently, can Broadway. Friday was only the overture.

Next: Day Two of The Festival — when Broadway’s weekend in the country really got underway.

Some Broadway friendships end when the final curtain comes down. Others apparently turn into a rock-and-roll band.

Michael Longoria

The Midtown Men brought their irresistible combination of Broadway polish, four-part harmony and pure 1960s swagger to Eisenhower Park’s Harry Chapin Lakeside Theatre, proving once again that Jersey Boys may have introduced these four men to one another, but it certainly wasn’t the end of their story.

Christian Hoff

Tony Award winner Christian Hoff, Michael Longoria, Daniel Reichard and Tony Award nominee J. Robert Spencer first shared a stage as members of the original Broadway company of Jersey Boys, the musical phenomenon that turned the story and songs of Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons into one of Broadway’s biggest hits.

Daniel Reichard

They spent more than a thousand performances together before doing something rather unusual: instead of simply moving on to their next individual Broadway jobs, they took the chemistry they had developed eight shows a week and created something of their own.

J. Robert Spencer

The result was The Midtown Men.

Michael Longoria, Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer

And while their pedigree is unmistakably Broadway, this isn’t Jersey Boys on tour. The Midtown Men became their own musical act, expanding beyond The Four Seasons to embrace the glorious pop landscape of the 1960s—The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Motown, The Rascals, The Mamas & the Papas, The Ronettes and more. Their official repertoire has long celebrated the decade that gave America some of its most enduring pop music, with four singers who know exactly how to sell both a harmony and a story.

Michael Longoria, Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer

What makes the group work isn’t simply nostalgia. Plenty of acts can recreate the music of the ’60s. The Midtown Men have something considerably harder to manufacture: history with one another.

Michael Longoria, Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer

They learned how to listen to one another on a Broadway stage. They know where the other voices are going, when to step forward, when to pull back and how to turn four leading men into one sound. Reichard has recalled that while they were still performing Jersey Boys, the four would gather in dressing rooms between shows and work out harmonies to other songs they loved from the decade. In other words, The Midtown Men were quietly being born backstage while another show was happening out front.

Michael Longoria, Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer

That musical shorthand followed them to Eisenhower Park.

Christian Hoff

Christian Hoff

Christian Hoff

Hoff brings the confidence that won him the Tony Award for his portrayal of Tommy DeVito. Reichard, Broadway’s original Bob Gaudio, possesses the musical-theatre storyteller’s instinct for finding the character inside a song. Spencer, the original Nick Massi and later a Tony nominee for Next to Normal, supplies formidable Broadway chops, while Longoria—who originated Joe Pesci before succeeding John Lloyd Young as Frankie Valli—knows a thing or two about sending a voice soaring above a crowd.

Michael Longoria

Michael Longoria

Michael Longoria

Together, however, they stop being four Broadway résumés and become a genuine group.

J. Robert Spencer

J. Robert Spencer

J. Robert Spencer

There is something wonderfully circular about what happened to these men. They began as actors playing a band, only to discover along the way that they actually were one. What started under Broadway lights developed into years of concerts across the country, recordings and even a nationally televised concert special.

Daniel Reichard

Daniel Reichard

Daniel Reichard

The Harry Chapin Lakeside Theatre is precisely the sort of setting where this music feels at home. These songs weren’t created to sit politely behind glass as artifacts of another era. They were made for summer nights, for dancing, singing along and suddenly realizing that you remember every word to a song you haven’t consciously thought about in twenty years.

Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard

That’s the pleasure of The Midtown Men. They don’t treat the 1960s as a museum exhibition. They remind you why this music became permanent in the first place.

Christian Hoff, Michael Longoria

The Beatles gave us exuberance. Motown gave popular music sophistication and irresistible rhythm. The Beach Boys made adolescent longing sound like California sunshine. The Four Seasons gave us those impossible harmonies and that unmistakable falsetto.

Daniel Reichard

J. Robert Spencer

Daniel Reichard, J. Robert Spencer,

Michael Longoria

Christian Hoff

Four Broadway actors fell in love with all of it. Nearly two decades after first coming together, Hoff, Longoria, Reichard and Spencer are still standing beside one another, still singing, still touring and still having what appears to be a ridiculously good time doing it.

Michael Longoria, Christian Hoff, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer

Not bad for four guys who were originally hired to pretend to be a band. Turns out they were just getting started.

G.H. Harding

VALLI COME, VALLI GO? — The big media news in the last few days has been whether Frankie Valli has officially retired. The 92-year-old singer canceled the remainder of that he’s his tour this year and has been picture in the media in a wheelchair, looking terrifically frail.

His brother Bobby issued a statement that Frankie would indeed be retiring then rescinded it a day later after an apparent admonishment from Frankie himself.

What gives?

Rumors abound that his wife, his fourth, Jackie, wants him to go on, most likely due to the amount of money a Valli-performance makes. From what I’ve been able to source, Valli never really made tons of money as the songs were written by Bob Gaudio and Bob Crewe (“Sherry,” “Big Girls Don’t Cry,” “Walk Like A Man”), and it was only when the play (and movie) Jersey Boys happened, that the dollars started flowing in. That said, if the man is in pain and poor health, he should address that first and foremost. No question.

Read more from The Daily Mail: https://www.dailymail.com/tvshowbiz/article-16054101/Frankie-Valli-92-touring-future-canceling-concerts-health-issues.html 

Whatever develops, he’s had a miraculous career and his songs are forever in the great American song book.

SHORT TAKES — For all you Odyssey fans; the Hollywood Reporter reminds that here was a 1997, four-hour miniseries on NBC, starring Vanessa Williams as Calypso; Isabella Rossellini as Athena; Bernadette Peters as Circe; and Armand Assante as Odysseus. Directed by Andrei Konchalovsky, it earned 5 Emmy noms and two wins and had no less than some guy named Francis Ford Coppola as a producer. Wild! …

Dave Marsh

The legendary Dave Marsh passed Friday and left quite the memory. From Creem Magazine to Bruce Springsteen to the Kristen Ann Carr foundation he was a passionate advocate of the arts and a terrific writer. The story about Creem’s Lester Bangs throwing a typewriter down the stairs, turns out to have been about Marsh, per writer Susan Whitall. He was a tough guy to get to know, but his passion was amazing. RIP Dave and condolences to Barbara Carr …

Copilot

Tom Cuddy turned us onto the band Copilot from Massachusetts and after several visits to their site, came across their music video for their absolutely compelling “Let Me Down.” The band is sensational and lead singer Maggie Hall is simply superb. What a voice! Check the video out here:

… Here’s a shout-out to Deadline for one of their best headlines ever: Holy cow! Or whatever kind of Holy is yelled out in a comic book, but Sony/Marvel Studio’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day crossed the $2 billion global mark, becoming the second fastest movie to do so and the eighth movie to ever cross that benchmark ...

Micky Dolenz on Chris Carters’ Breakfast With The Beatles on SiriusXM /Beatles Channel, September 6, discussing his new EP Timeless which features “Terri” and the just-released “Waiting For Day”  … Watched Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008) again; what an amazing picture with star performances from Christian Bale; Gary Oldman; Morgan Freeman; and Gary Oldman. I saw it when it first came out, but after witnessing his genius in The Odyssey, I think I appreciated it a lot more this time around. And what a standout performance from Heath Ledger as The Joker. Positively chilling … Happy BDay to Russ Titelman and Madonna … RIP Arlene Smith.

NAMES IN THE NEWS — Ty Burr; Keifer Sutherland; Harrison Ford; Bill McCuddy; Gary Graff; Katie Couric; Cory Robbins; Eddie O’Loughlin; Bill Adler; Kevin Mazur; Chuck Pulin; Manny Bella; Josh Fellner; Tom & Lisa Cuddy; Hal Wilner; Lou Reed; Andy Greene; Jon Landau; Chris Ortiz; Lisa Warren; Amanda Naylor; Mark Bego; Dave Marken; and CHIP!

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One of New York’s favorite summer traditions continued this week as Broadway in Bryant Park once again turned the Midtown lawn into an open-air theatre, bringing together performers from The Book of Mormon, The Great Gatsby, Heathers: The Musical and Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorized Musical Parody for an afternoon of free performances.

Helen Little

Ashley De La Rosa

Ashley De La Rosa, Helen Little

Presented by 106.7 LITE FM, the afternoon was hosted by the station’s Helen Little, with Ashley De La Rosa joining as co-host. Broadway in Bryant Park has long been one of those quintessentially New York events: office workers on lunch breaks, theatre lovers and tourists gathering on the lawn while Broadway performers trade their usual proscenium arches for sunshine, skyscrapers and a decidedly less formal audience.

J. Casey Barrett. Vance Klassen, Andrew Nelin, Kevin Clay. Andrew Stevens Purdy, Thomas Doelger, Diego Enrico, Joshua Keen and Henry McGuiness

Diego Enrico and Kevin Clay

Thomas Doelger and Charlie Franklin

Diego Enrico and Kevin Clay

The Book of Mormon, still one of Broadway’s most irreverent long-running hits, was represented by J. Casey Barrett, Vance Klassen, Andrew Nelin, Kevin Clay, Andrew Stevens Purdy, Thomas Doelger, Diego Enrico, Charlie Franklin, Joshua Keen and Henry McGuinness. More than a decade after arriving on Broadway, the musical continues to demonstrate the remarkable staying power of a show that turned religious satire, outrageous comedy and an unexpectedly traditional musical-theatre heart into a theatrical phenomenon.

Alex Prakken, Brandon J. Large, Nathaniel Hunt, Traci Elaine Lee, Drew Lake, Justin Keats, Emily Anne Nester, Matt Wiercinski and Kurt Csolak

The Cast of The Great Gatsby that includes, Brandon J. Large, Nathaniel Hunt, Traci Elaine Lee, Drew Lake, Justin Keats, Emily Anne Nester, Matt Wiercinski and Kurt Csolak

Alex Prakken

Alex Prakken

Alex Prakken

The Cast of The Great Gatsby that includes, Brandon J. Large, Nathaniel Hunt, Traci Elaine Lee, Drew Lake, Justin Keats, Emily Anne Nester, Matt Wiercinski and Kurt Csolak

The glamour of the Jazz Age arrived courtesy of The Great Gatsby, with Alex Prakken, Brandon J. Large, Nathaniel Hunt, Traci Elaine Lee, Drew Lake, Justin Keats, Emily Anne Nester, Matt Wiercinski and Kurt Csolak taking the Bryant Park stage. The Broadway musical, inspired by F. Scott Fitzgerald’s quintessential American novel, brought a splash of Gatsby excess to the lawn—a fitting contrast to the decidedly democratic pleasure of seeing Broadway for free in the middle of Manhattan.

John Cardoza, Thalia Atallah, Ava DeMary, Jackera Davis, Zan Berube, Kiara Michelle Lee, Emma Benson and Syd Sider

John Cardoza and Kiara Michelle Lee

John Cardoza and Kiara Michelle Lee

John Cardoza

Jackera Davis, Zan Berube and Ava DeMary

Things became considerably darker—and deliciously more dangerous—with Heathers: The Musical. John Cardoza, Kiara Michelle Lee, Thalia Atallah, Ava DeMary, Jackera Davis, Zan Berube, Emma Benson and Syd Siderrepresented the cult musical, whose wicked combination of teenage cruelty, black comedy and infectious pop-rock music has given Heathers a devoted following that has only grown since the show first arrived in New York.

Jay Armstrong Johnson and Ryann Redmond

Kevin Clay

Ryan Duncan

Daniel Brackett, Ryan Duncan, Shelby Acosta, Jay Armstrong Johnson, Cherry Torres and Ryann Redmond

Daniel Brackett

Jay Armstrong Johnson

Ryann Redmond

Then came one of the afternoon’s cheekier offerings, Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorized Musical Parody. Daniel Brackett, Ryan Duncan, Shelby Acosta, Jay Armstrong Johnson, Cherry Torres and Ryann Redmond brought the parody to Bryant Park, adding another flavor entirely to a program that happily jumped from established Broadway blockbusters to cult favorites and irreverent new work.

Jane Fujita

Daielle Dellilo

Eyllah Babbitt, Danielle Dellilo and Kelly Branco

Also participating in the afternoon were Eyllah Babbitt, Danielle Dellilo and Kelly Branco, along with Jane Fujita

and representatives from Taiwan Tourism, adding to an event that has increasingly become as much a Midtown summer gathering as a theatrical sampler.

That has always been the particular charm of Broadway in Bryant Park. Broadway can be expensive, carefully scheduled and sometimes intimidating to those who don’t regularly venture inside its theatres. Here, the walls disappear. There is no velvet rope separating the initiated from the curious. Someone can wander through Bryant Park, hear an extraordinary voice coming from the stage, sit down on the lawn and discover a show they had never considered seeing.

And for Broadway itself, that matters. A few songs performed on a summer afternoon can accomplish what an advertisement sometimes cannot: they allow an audience to experience the performers themselves. The theatre becomes immediate, accessible and wonderfully difficult to ignore.

Broadway in Bryant Park continues throughout the summer at Bryant Park, located along Sixth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets. Lawn seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.

In a city where Broadway normally begins when the house lights go down, Bryant Park continues to prove that sometimes the best way to sell the magic of theatre is simply to bring it outside and let New York stumble upon it.