THE BEATLE ON BROADWAY - The Beatles Bookstore

THE NEON LIGHTS ARE NOT ALWAYS BRIGHT FOR THE BEATLES ON BROADWAY

The Beatles enormous success in music and album production is unparalleled in the world. However, when their music has been translated into Broadway and Off-Broadway productions, that success has been somewhat limited. In fact, there have been a few box-office flops.

Here are a few of the shows dealing with the Beatles phenomenon appearing in the theater since the group disbanded all those years ago! With only a couple of rare exceptions, Beatles music via covers does not have a long shelf life. However in Las Vegas, the Love show using the actual Beatles music cleverly manipulated by the talents of the late George Martin and his son, Giles into a lavish production has stood the test of time!

I am aware that not all of the theater productions are being presented here, please bear with me!

Even though I do not collect posters, I did purchase this five foot subway poster for the collection. Because the play had such a short run, I bought one as a longterm investment. Wise or not, I do not know!

45X 60 INCH Subway Poster for the short run Lennon play

TWO UNRELEASED JOHN LENNON SONGS

This show quite frankly bombed despite having the worldwide performance premiere of two unreleased John Lennon songs, “India, India” and “Now and Then,” also known as “I Don’t Want to Lose You.”

LENNON CAST SIGNED OPENING NIGHT PLAYBILL AUGUST 14 2005
A signed Lennon Opening Night playbill.

This playbill was signed by over 5 cast members!!!!!

This playbill has the dated Opening Night special page (August 14, 2005).

This performance by musician John Waters was very successful in an Australian theater run but was not as well-received by a New York audience.

BEATLEMANIA

Probably the most successful of the Beatles-related Broadway/Off-Broadway productions. Mitch Weissman was the McCartney look-alike in this production and did an excellent job in his portrayal of Paul. Apparently the Beatles were not happy with the production based on several interviews with the ex-Beatles and several attempts at legal action.

Sgt Pepper – The Beatles on Broadway

I saw the pre-Broadway appearance of this show in Hartford, Connecticut. John and May Pang appeared one night at a NY performance and Yoko was also at that show. At a later show, Paul and Linda were present to view how the Beatles handiwork was being presented. The length of time that the show was active could certainly not be considered a rousing success! The critics were not very kind!

They certainly forgot two other very important people in this inside page of the program!

RAIN

One of the more pleasant recreation of Beatles songs by the stellar Beatles cover-band, Rain!

LOVE

The Crème de la crème- and not by accident!!!

Here is a play and program presented in the UK. Both Paul and George despised this production. George after having viewed this play, withdrew permission to use any of his songs in the performance.

There are certainly more Beatles-related theatrical productions over the years, but space limitations have limited this post to the ones cited above. Hope you enjoyed the posting!

IT WAS GOING TO BE A WONDERFUL LIFE UNTIL…

I was so disappointed to hear that the planned staged theatrical production of Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life will not see the light of day despite Paul having composed at least 10 songs for the musical. Apparently the producer of the play, Bill Kenwright and Paul had business differences as to how the play should be staged and then the producer passed away before they had a resolution to the issue. The producer had purchased the rights to It’s A Wonderful Life from the Capra Estate and now it appears that this potential very promising project will never see the light of day! Very sad news…indeed!

EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: It’s A wonderful life for Paul McCartney but musical halted over ‘creative differences’ | Daily Mail Online

Do you have a favourite? Let me know?

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