Word: hedwig
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...strange that rock 'n' roll in all its flamboyance so rarely finds common ground with theater. The rock musical Hedwig is an exception. A bona fide off-Broadway smash and soon-to-be-movie, Hedwig also makes a captivating rock-'n'-roll album. The tale of a transsexual trailer-park denizen, Hedwig echoes the gender-blending audacity of late 1970s David Bowie and the hormone-stoked feverishness of early Meat Loaf. But John Cameron Mitchell's vocals and Stephen Trask's music have their own raw poetry. The spirit of Hedwig shines through: cheeky, resilient, wounded but triumphant...
...HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH John Cameron Mitchell, who co-wrote this off-Broadway hit, also plays the "internationally ignored" song stylist who changed sexes to escape East Germany. Part nightclub monologue, part drag musical, the show has a score that outrocks Rent and a script that is by turns funny, outrageous and poignant...
Away from Broadway, however, several smaller shows are bringing in throngs of young people. Often they do it by breaking genre boundaries, mixing in elements of rock concerts or performance art. Hedwig and the Angry Inch, a hot ticket for months, is the life story of a transsexual rock star, told in the form of an autobiographical nightclub act. De La Guarda's circus-like theater piece, Villa Villa, features performers who swoop and soar on cables above the audience (which stands during the entire 60-min. spectacle). "These shows are reinventing theatrical language," says David Binder...
Producers are also looking for new ways to market their shows to young theatergoers. Rent distributes book covers in schools. Hedwig hands out postcards at rock clubs and has created logo stickers for backpacks and skateboards. These efforts, of course, can help attract more than just skateboarders. "Once people hear that the younger folks are going," says Drew Hodges, whose Spotco agency created the ad campaigns for De La Guarda and other shows, "there's a real aspirational crowd that is 30 to 45 and wants to be in the same places as the trend makers who are 22." Young...
...Mitchell may have the Titanic of drag musicals. Since opening on Valentine's Day, Hedwig has attracted a mix of uptown theatergoers, kids from the club scene and celebrities like Goldie Hawn, Glenn Close and David Bowie. The show just won an Outer Critics Circle award for best off-Broadway musical, a concept album is in the works, and there's already talk of a movie. Couldn't happen to a nicer girly...