New York's Broadway season star-studded again

(AFP PHOTO/Shaun Curry)

When Denzel Washington, Scarlett Johansson, Jude Law, and Catherine Zeta-Jones starred on last year's Broadway theater stage, the Tony Awards featured a Hollywood cast picking up theatrical awards. The trend of casting stars has proved popular and a way to ensure the success of the play.

Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman were in a one-act play called A Steady Rain which Jeremy Gerard, theater critic for Bloomberg News, described as "James Bond and Wolverine in a two-character play," he said, adding that it was a poor play but "audiences went home happy."

This fall, Broadway producers seek to continue the roll call of top-flight actors in staged productions, with Patrick Stewart appearing in David Mamet's A Life in the Theatre. The show co-stars T. R. Knight ( Grey's Anatomy) and begins performances September 21.

Also, Vanessa Redgrave and James Earl Jones will pair up in the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Driving Miss Daisy, about an aging Southern woman and her chauffeur. The story has also been made into an Oscar-winning movie. Miss Daisy looks to be a sell-out because it will have a limited run. Performances start on October. 7.

On September 14, previews begin on Angels in America: Millennium Approaches, starring Zachary Quinto ( Star Trek, the movie) performing in Tony Kushner's award-winning play in two parts.

In November, Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark will open. Though there are no television or film actors in the show, the musical is directed by Julie Taymor ( Across the Universe) and the music and lyrics are by musical stars U2's Bono and The Edge.

RC