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The Threepenny Opera Now Open on Broadway

May. 01, 2006

Kurt WeillKurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's masterpiece of the lyric stage, The Threepenny Opera, opened on April 20, 2006 in a stunning new revival by the Roundabout Theater Company at the theater at Studio 54 on Broadway. Starring Alan Cumming, Jim Dale, Ana Gasteyer, Cyndi Lauper and Nellie McKay, this updated Threepenny is directed by Scott Elliott and marks the first outing for Wallace Shawn's new English translation applauded by The New Yorker critic John Lahr as hitting "the right notes of cynical Brechtian vulgarity. Brecht, a great poet, brought to the stage a combination of slangy simplicity and sophistication which Shawn matched with his own colloquial cunning." Terry Teachout remarks in The Wall Street Journal that "Mr. Elliott's staging is unmistakablly Brechtian in style" and Ben Brantley in The New York Times calls Weill's Threepenny Opera "the granddaddy of all the singing, stinging portraits of fat societies on their eves of destruction. He continues, "Looking like Dietrich and sounding like a Brooklyn Piaf, Ms. Lauper delivers Jenny's ballads with teary, soulful intensity… [and] leads, in Lenya-like style, the show's famous prologue, 'Song of the Extraordinary Crimes of Mac the Knife.'" Howard Shapiro of The Philadelphia Inquirer singles out Threepenny's intensity, decadence and longevity ("still cutting-edge at 78") and describes this revival as and having "the energy of a laser beam." He comments, "Alan Cumming, with his magnificent Scottish accent and a menacing playfulness that's a joy to watch, is the Macheath of your dreams—unbridled and passionate, especially when he sings." The show's limited engagement runs through June 18. Not to be missed!

The Kurt Weill Foundation’s new Threepenny site can be found at www.threepennyopera.org. For tickets or further information about the Roundabout Theater’s production of The Threepenny Opera, please visit the Roundabout Theater’s Threepenny website at www.3pennyonbroadway.com. To learn about Kurt Weill’s life and music, please visit the Kurt Weill Foundation’s website at www.kwf.org.

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