Al Pacino is no stranger to the Pulitzer-prize winning play, Glengarry Glen Ross; he played one of the lead characters, Ricky Roma, in the remake movie in 1992. Pacino was nominated for an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for his portrayal, but lost out to Gene Hackman (“Unforgiven”) and Tommy Lee Jones (“The Fugitive”) respectively. Now Pacino will have another chance but this time, in its original format, on the Broadway stage. And he won’t be taking up the familiar role of Ricky either.

This time he’ll be playing the role of Shelly Levene — one of four down-on-their-luck real estate agents that’s at the mercy of their ruthless boss, John Williamson. All of the agents despise Williamson but need him, because he’s the office manager that hands out the leads (as well as all the dirty tricks to use in order to capture those leads.) Levene, who was once very successful, has now become desperate and when sucking up to the boss isn’t enough, he starts to use his own dirty tricks — talking about how he needs to support his daughter.

Producing the play is Jam Theatricals, the same production team that won the play a Tony Award when it appeared as a revival on Broadway in 2005. Jeffrey Richards and Jerry Frankle will also be helping with the play’s production; and Daniel Sullivan will be directing.

The play will be running at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theater with previews beginning on October 16 and the official opening set for November 11.

It seems a lot of things are going nostalgic today, including fashion, décor, and even the theater. Many are longing for the days of Vaudeville. Add in to that a dash of risqué cabaret, a bit of raunchy comedy, and even a touch of circus and you have Spiegelworld’s newest production “Empire”. Empire is currently scheduled to play from June 2012 until the first few days of September. Those finding themselves in New York, New York have the opportunity to witness this show that is unlike any other. You can catch the show at the 440-seat tent (decked out in mirrors and velvet) on West 45th Street.

Empire is a show that has it all! You will see amazing physical feats that really show off how hard these performers work as well as singing, dancing, juggling, roller skating, ballet, illusions and even the German wheel. We don’t want to give too much away, but at the heart of the show is also a pretty funny story about broke billionaires to tie it all together.

The director is Wayne Harrison and the choreographer is John O’Connell, who has done work on Moulin Rouge, Enchanted, and Strictly Ballroom among others, so you know it is going to be a feast for the eyes. Everything has a bit of a sexy feel to it, as the jokes are bawdy and the girls are scantily clad, and there are even some flashes of male nudity.

This is a summer only show, so getting your tickets early is a smart move. As mentioned before, each show only has 440 seats, and the stage is practically at your fingertips. This is especially fun as you get to see all of the amazing acts really up close and personal. This also means that the show sells out quickly, especially as word spreads and it becomes ever more popular.

See some of the classy shows on Broadway this summer, and then come check out all the naughty, death defying fun at Empire. This is sure to be one of your favorite shows of the season, so don’t miss it!

Monday evening saw the opening gala for the American Ballet Theater, an opening that’s always highly anticipated as it re-enacts snippets of the most iconic plays and ballets; and gives theater-goers a chance to see that season’s talent for the first time. But after the opening early this week, the ballet may still be cowering from the scathing reviews received for its opening night.

The New York Times gave the ballet the harshest review of them all, criticizing everything from the audience that was too loud to the “solo violinist [that] was seldom in tune throughout the evening, but he reserved his flattest and scratchiest playing for the pas de deux from Act II of “Swan Lake.” The Times weren’t any more forgiving when the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School performed a number either, saying the “routine they danced made the students look efficiently trite.”

It wasn’t just felt by the Times either. The New York Post also noticed some problems, although they were much kinder about the event than the Times. The Post instead was content to keep themselves to saying that while the bright moments made it all worthwhile, “several of the dancers looked off form. Gilliam Murphy hunched her shoulders, more vulture than ‘Black Swan.’ Julie Kent’s dancing in ‘Onegin’ was intelligent, but tentative. Alina Cojocaru was miscast as the fallen woman Manon, striking no sparks with retiring principal dancer Angel Corella.”

But does a poor opening spell trouble for a theater’s entire season? As most art, it depends on what you’re looking for. The Post is hopeful, saying “With the gala over, the company is now setting into a run of one of its best productions yet.”

However, the Times doesn’t see it. “It represents far too many of the worst trends in ballet, and emphatically suggests that they are on the increase.” Well if that’s the case, the season may be saved after all.

Just about every kid is a fan of “the world’s biggest preschool band,” The Wiggles, and as the group prepares to turn 21 this year, they’re taking their act on the road and are bringing some old friends along for the ride.

The tour will start on July 12 at the Valley View Casino Center in San Diego and will run for five weeks around the United States with stops along the way including Los Angeles, Phoenix, Orlando, and Atlanta. On each stop, children can expect to be delighted by some of the band’s biggest hits off any one of their 40 albums, including hits like Hot Potato, Toot Toot Chugga Chugga, and Rock a Byer Your Bear. Familiar friends such as Dorothy the Dinosaur, Captain Feathersword, Wags the Dog, and Henry the Octopus will all be there as well to go on adventures and play with The Wiggles.

Someone else very special joining the band this time is Greg Page, the original Yellow Wiggle. Page has been unable to travel with the band over the past five years after complications of a hernia had him facing some very serious health issues. Back to full health, Page says, “I’m so excited to be back with my friends and to be entertaining our incredible fans again.”

This isn’t the first time The Wiggles have been on tour to celebrate their summer birthday; last summer they trekked across the country on the “Big Birthday Summer Tour.”

Standing outside of the Broadhurst Theatre you may think that you’re just going to see the latest revival of A Streetcar Named Desire. Then step inside, and you’re transported to the middle of the French Quarter in New Orleans, in that little ol’ dingy apartment of Stella and Stanley’s. And that whole multi-racial element that was so talked about during the show’s promotion and pre-production phase? Completely forgot about, the few tweaked details aside.

Blair Underwood, taking on the part of Stanley, brought to the stage all the roughness and “animal-like” characteristics that define Stanley’s very core character; yet when around Stella, played by Daphne Rubin-Vega, he completely breaks down into a man of completely vulnerability, but completely unlike the boyish qualities possessed by his on-screen predecessor, Marlon Brando. And if you’re waiting on the edge of your seat for that iconic “Stella-aaaaa” howl, you’ll get it. But Underwood makes it his own by donning a red t-shirt instead of the white tank Brando made synonymous with the play.

Rubin-Vega holds her own to Underwood’s Stanley, helping portray the complete disillusionment and denial in which she and Stanley continue to live. When Stella’s fragile southern belle sister Blanche, played by Nicole Ari Parker, comes to town to shed some light (and reality) on the situation, she does it flawlessly. She’s the very one who calls Stanley “animal-like” to the blind Stella yet ironically, is also the one carted away to the psyche asylum at the end of the play.

Yes, with the latest A Streetcar Named Desire you definitely forget about the multi-racial cast that was so highly touted during its early production phases, and can enjoy simply being transported back once again into the world that was Tennessee Williams. The fact that Stanley’s Polish last name has been taken out, and that the original segregated bar was replaced with one that was not, are the only reminders that this play was originally more about hype than real, raw talent — and that’s exactly what this play is from start to finish.

There may be nothing better than watching a Disney production play out right before your eyes, and Disney Theatrical’s Newsies doesn’t disappoint. The play whisks you back to New York City, 1899 telling the classic tale of newsboys taking on the big bosses they work for.

While the chaps in breaches in caps dancing and singing jauntily are sure to please the kids and teenagers in the crowd, the lyrics and overall theme is sure to resonate with the adults in the crowd. The play is already wildly popular, much more so than the 1992 movie it’s based on, and comes at a particularly poignant moment in history, as Occupiers still sit in many streets and the fight against the management and the rich has never seemed more pressing.

The play has been adapted by Harvey Fierstein from the screenplay written by Bob Tzudiker and Noni White while Jess Goldstein is responsible for those costumes that takes you back to another time. Starring in the play are John Dossett who plays Joseph Pulitzer, the publisher of the newspaper; Jeremy Jordan who plays Jack, the leader of the newsboy uprising; Kara Lindsay play Katherine, the helpful reporter; Ben Fankhauser as Davey; Andrew Kennan-Bolger as Crutchie; and Matthew J. Schechter and Lewis Grosso alternating in the part of Davey’s brother.

The show was set to run until in the theatre until June 10 but has been given a two-month extension due to the huge amount of advance sales its already generated, and raving audience responses.

How could you forget Jack Hanna? This is the kind of face you remember, if not for his many hilarious appearances on The Late Show with David Letterman, then for the simple fact that his droll expression is usually partly covered by a kuskus–or something other bizarre animal crawling all over his head and shoulders. He is also easily identified by his outfit: a khaki safari outfit, a dark tan and a crazy Southern accent.

Yes, Jack Hanna has the earned the distinction of “Jungle Jack“, and not only because of his fame. In fact, Hanna started as an American zookeeper and is almost single-handedly responsible for elevating the quality and reputation of the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium in Ohio to worldwide renown. One of the ways he improved the zoo was by transitioning animals from cages to habitat environments.

He got his start on a Tennessee farm owned by his father, and started working with animals at the impressionable age of 11, landing an assistant position to a veterinarian. He studied business and political science in Ohio before getting in trouble for keeping ducks in his dorm room and a donkey in a shed. He later opened a pet shop and petting zoo.

Hanna, now age 65, has kept busy publishing books (Monkeys on the Interstate) and has also hosted the TV show Jack Hanna’s Animal Adventures. He also pops up on daytime TV, and oddly enough, in music videos; in 2005, he appeared in Neal McCoy’s “Billy’s Got His Beer Goggles On” along with a trio of wild animals. He has been talking retirement as of late, but as recently as October 19, 2011, he was still on active duty. He helped Ohio police officials track down many exotic animals near Zanesville, Ohio who were mysteriously released before a private owner’s suicide.

You can still catch Jack on TV…but why not make plans to see him and his wild animal friends live and in person? These shows are popular for children and adults, because you never know what Jack is going to bring out. These shows are educational, thrilling and often times funny, because animals are usually such bad actors!

While Nicole Kidman may have seemed more comfortable on the silver screen in the past decade than she has on the Great White Way, she’s about to prove once again why she was such a hit there in 1998. Back then she played five different roles in The Blue Room, written by David Hare and directed by Sam Mendes. This time, she’ll take on just one role, that of Joan Scott-Fowler in After the Dance.

The show first ran in 2010 in London’s National Theatre and had audiences continually coming back for more. The story is one about a desperate woman, Joan, who’s stuck in a marriage that began for all the wrong reasons; yet she struggles to hang onto it. Her fight comes to an end when her husband meets a much younger woman and ends the marriage; leaving Joan not only desperate, but alone too. And while ‘desperate’ is not a word that anyone would use to describe Nicole Kidman, with her past ups and downs in marriages, it’s definitely a role she can bring some real grit to.

Kidman was supposed to appear in Sweet Bird of Youth alongside James Franco, but that project has been postponed. It’s been said that Kidman was very eager to get into another theater project right away.

While there is no official word yet on when the show will begin its Broadway run, it’s thought that it will be in the lineup of spring or fall of next year.

Say what you will about the 84th Annual Academy Awards, they sure do a great job of publicizing low-budget movies and even a few Broadway and Off-Broadway shows. While there is no stage version of The Artist or Hugo, there were Broadway shows for other nominated films.

Warhorse may have gone home empty-handed on Oscar night, but the play version of the film picked up five Tony Awards in 2011, including Best Play, Best Director, Best Scenic Design, Best Lighting and Best Sound. The production even won a special award for puppetry performance. W.E. was only nominated once, but its writer and director Madonna is no stranger to Oscar parties or live performances for that matter. Long before her movie picked up a Best Costume Design nomination, she was turning heads for her work in the Oscar-winning Evita (based on the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber) as well as the Warren Beatty remake of Dick Tracy. Madonna is still touring the U.S. and was last seen belting out numbers of the Super Bowl halftime show.

Perhaps it was fitting (or planned that way) that Collin Firth presented Meryl Streep’s Best Actress category and watched as Streep won her third Best Actress statue. The two stars previously worked together on the film Mamma Mia, which was based on a stage play written by Catherine Johnson and influenced by the songs of ABBA. Lastly, we had the political drama The Ides of March starring George Clooney, which was originally based on the 2008 play Farragut North.

Of course, the best performance of Oscar night may well have been that of Cirque Du Soleil, who gave a dazzling tribute to the movies with death-defying leaps and bizarre feats of strength. Yes, Cirque Du Soleil has been making waves for decades, and every once in a while Hollywood does a double take on this very creative and energetic entity. Cirque Du Soleil is currently touring across the U.S. and also performing live in Las Vegas. Some of their hottest shows today include Viva Elvis, Zumanity, O, Mystere, Ka and The Beatles: Love. If you loved them at the Oscar show, come give them a standing ovation in person!

This may have been a weak year for Broadway-to-movie adaptations, but at least the theatre stole the show!

The performance of Berenstain Bears LIVE! has been on the New York scene ever since it opened at the Manhattan Movement and Arts Center on June 25, 2011. The show has been a favorite of audiences, playing off the children’s television show, which is based on the series of books written by Jan Berenstain. But while the show has been popular for almost a year, there are two performances coming up that are more timely, and will be more moving, than ever.

Jan Berenstain, co-writer of the books with her late husband Stan Berenstain, sadly passed away on February 24, 2012 after suffering a massive stroke. Those working on her life’s art are deeply saddened, as is a world of generations that grew up on the bear family. To honor Berenstain’s work, two tribute performances will show on March 3 and 4 at the Marjorie S. Deane Little Theatre.

The show will be filled with lots of antics from Brother Bear, much curiosity from Sister Bear, bad habits played out by playful Papa Bear, and the calming voice of reason, Mama Bear — everything that audiences have already come to love so much. Not a lot is being said about what the additional tribute to Ms. Berenstain will include, but it’s sure to shine a well-deserved spotlight on this artist’s life work.

The two shows are being directed by Devanand Janki, and the cast includes: Joel Anthony Frank, Lindsie Detota, Melissa Joiner, Drew Torkelson, Haley Greenstein, and Gerry Vega. Tickets for both the tribute performances and the regularly scheduled shows are now on sale.