The Movie Musical: Broadway’s Hollywood Problem

Why does Hollywood get a bad rap on the Great White Way?

Sara Bareilles in Waitress: The Musical (Bleecker Street)

For nearly 20 years, the folks who created Broadway shows and the folks who bought tickets to those shows, the height of glitz and glamour in the theater world, would religiously tune into a public television show that was anything but. Theater Talk, the syndicated program hosted by the show's producer Susan Haskins and Michael Riedel of the New York Post, was small-scale, cramped, and, above all, catty. 

Riedel, a gossip columnist known for pointed vendettas and scandalous hit pieces, used the show as a soapbox for his nasty opinions about Broadway's biggest flops and what he thought were its most undeserving stars - oftentimes to their face. Yes, the Tony nominees and stunt casts would visit Susan's set to promote their work, but it was Michael they would have to face for approval.

A bi-annual highlight of the show was the Spring and Fall previews, looking ahead at the openings (or, as Michael relished, the closings) on Broadway, joined by the cattiest group around town: Ben Brantley, Peter Marks, Michael Musto, Adam Feldman, and others. At the time, it was often an excuse to out-venom each other. Now, with the show off the air since 2018, the segments feel like time capsules of the critical opinion at large. If all five people on the panel agreed about something, you can be sure it would be critical consensus. 

In the Spring 2016 episode, after bemoaning the success of Hamilton, they discuss the other musicals of that Broadway season with a who cares? attitude. Michael brings up Waitress, the musical that opened in March of that year, because he has to:

"So we just have to deal quickly here with a small show. Some people like it, I feel it's a bit cynical...is Waitress based on that cute little movie where she bakes pies and finds herself? Is it any good?"