Marc and Dee Dee: The Choreographers You Never Knew

When Walt Disney began production on Mary Poppins (1964) in the early 1960s, he intended from the very beginning it would be a musical. Disney gave extra attention to each detail of the film, including hiring Julie Andrews to play the title role, Robert Stevenson to direct, Bill Walsh to co-produce, and Richard M. and Robert B. Sherman to write the music. Finding choreographers to stage the musical numbers, however, was a challenge for Walt, although he hired Tom Mahoney to choreograph Babes in Toyland (1961) as well as various episodes of The Mickey Mouse Club (1955-1956) and The Magical World of Disney (1954-1991), Mahoney, at this point, wasn’t available as he was committed to choreographing Bikini Beach (1964), which starred fellow Mouseketeers Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello. 

Disney relied on “Poppins,” actor Dick Van Dyke to see if he knew any choreographers, and Van Dyke recommended a husband and wife team, Marc Breaux and Dee Dee Wood, with whom he had worked with on The Andy Williams Show (1962-1963). Prior to television, they had also choreographed the original production of the Broadway musical Do-Re-Mi, which has nothing to do with the song from The Sound of Music (1965). Although both husband and wife had made dancing credits on television and on Broadway, neither had ever choreographed a motion picture but it didn’t stop at Disney. 

In addition to choreographing all the dance numbers in the film, (from “Jolly Holliday,” to “Step in Time,”) both Breaux and Wood made other unique contributions to the film. Wood suggested that during the Jolly Holiday sequence, Mary Poppins’ umbrella and Bert’s cane, do an animatronic dance of their own. She originally thought that that would be impossible, though she was later told by someone “Never say that anything at Disney is impossible!” Breaux also provided the singing voice of the cow in the Jolly Holiday sequence. When they heard the Sherman brothers’ score, they both knew they were a part of something special, as did everyone else who was involved with the movie. 

Helping “Poppins,” become the blockbuster that it became, Breaux and Wood, were then hired to choreograph “The Sound of Music,” which reunited them with Julie Andrews and “Poppins,” conductor Irwin Kostal. In 1967, they were re-hired by Walt Disney to stage the musical numbers for The Happiest Millionaire, which ignited the film career of Lesley Ann Warren, and would also be the last live-action movie that Walt Disney would supervise. (He passed away during the film’s production.) Their next film after that was MGM’s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968), which also featured Irwin Kostal’s conducting, another score written by the Shermans, and was also a reunion for the two of them with Dick Van Dyke. 

Although their marriage would unfortunately end in divorce, they remained close and also choreographed movies such as United Artists’ Huckleberry Finn (1974), and Universal’s The Slipper and the Rose (1976), both of which also featured songs by the Shermans. In the later 1970s, Marc Breaux had some health issues and went to work as a film editor for Sunset Gower Studios until his retirement in the mid-1990s. Wood choreographed for a while longer and is also known for having choreographed the Touchstone Pictures film, Beaches (1988), which starred Bette Midler, as well as another episode of “Magical World of Disney.” She retired to Mesa, Arizona where she currently lives—and while her former husband remained in Los Angeles, he later rejoined her, where he sadly passed away on November 19th, 2013. Marc Breaux and Dee Dee Wood’s legacy of dance will live on: for most of us it will be in beloved favorites primarily in “Poppins,” “Sound of Music,” and “Chitty Chitty.”     

Disney on Broadway Part II!

This blog continues our tribute to Disney shows launched on Broadway. Starting with (“Beauty and the Beast,” and “The Lion King,”) Disney has become a “force of nature,” drawing huge crowds with their Broadway shows, largely re-working their film masterpieces for the stage. Please feel free to comment on anything you find interesting  

• “Mary Poppins,” opened at the New Amsterdam Theatre on November 16th, 2006. It received seven Tony Nominations, including Best Musical, and won the award for Best Scenic Design, playing a total of 2,619 performances. Gavin Lee originated the role of Bert the Chimney Sweep in “Mary Poppins,” on Broadway, in the first National Tour, and also in London’s Original West End Production which premiered two years prior at the Bristol Hippodrome. In addition to featuring the original film’s Academy-Award-Winning Score by Richard M. and Robert B. Sherman, the show also featured new music written by George Stiles and Anthony Drew.
• In 2007, Disney produced an original stage adaptation tour of the hit movie-musical, High School Musical. It was Disney’s first stage adaptation of a made-for-television movie. The tour started in Chicago, Illinois on August 1st, 2007 and ended in Salt Lake City, Utah on August 3rd, 2008. After closing in Utah, the tour went on to Canada and then the UK, Ireland, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, and various other countries. In addition to all the classic songs from the original 2006 film being included in the show, the show also featured new music from a various list of composers.
• Disney’s Broadway Adaptation of The Little Mermaid, opened at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on January 10th, 2008. Starring Sierra Boggess as Ariel, Norm Lewis as King Triton, Eddie Korbich as Scuttle, Titus Burgess as Sebastian, and Brian D’Addario as Flounder, it was a smash success. (Incidentally, I am thrilled to have personally met each of them after seeing a performance in New York.) The show closed on August 30th, 2009 after a total of 685 performances and received Tony Nominations for Best Lighting Design of a Musical and Best Original Score Written for the Theatre for Alan Menken who also won the Best Original Score Oscar for the film version.
• In 2011, Disney collaborated with Whoopi Goldberg and Stage Entertainment to produce Sister Act: The Musical based on the 1992 Touchstone Pictures film of the same name (which starred Goldberg). The show opened at the Broadway Theatre on April 20th, 2010 and closed on August 26th, 2012 after a total of 561 performances. It was nominated for five Tonys, including Best Musical and featured the music of Alan Menken and the direction of Jerry Zaks, who had previously collaborated together in the 2003 Original Broadway Production of Little Shop of Horrors. “Sister Act,” also starred Fred Applegate as the Monsignor—he had previously played Lumiere in the first National Tour of “Beauty and the Beast.” 
• In 2012, Disney produced the play Peter and the Starcatcher, a prequel to the story of Peter Pan. The plot serves as a backstory for the characters of Peter Pan, Mrs. Darling, Tinker Bell, and Captain Hook. Written by Rick Elice, the play was nominated for nine Tonys. It won five, one of which was for Christian Borle who won in the category of Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play, for his performance as Black Stache, who is the character who goes on to become Captain Hook. (Prior to this play, Borle replaced Gavin Lee in the role of Bert in “Mary Poppins.)
• The same year as “Peter and the Starcatcher,” Disney also produced Newsies on Broadway. Opening at the Nederlander Theatre on March 29th, 2012 and closing on August 24th, 2014 after 1,004 performances, the show was nominated for eight Tonys, including Best Musical, and won two: Best Original Score and Best Choreography. Harvey Fierstein was the librettist for the show, and he received a Tony Nomination for his efforts. In addition to being a talented actor and librettist, Fierstein is also known at Disney for being the voice of Yao in Mulan (1998). Jeremy Jordan was also nominated for a Tony for his performance of Jack “Cowboy” Kelly, a role originated by Christian Bale in the 1992 film of the same name.
• In 2014, Disney produced Aladdin on Broadway. The show opened at the New Amsterdam Theatre on March 20th of that year and is still currently playing today. The show starred Adam Jacobs as Aladdin, Courtney Reed as Jasmine, and James Monroe Igelhart as the Genie. Jonathan Freeman, who ironically voiced Jafar in the original 1992 film, reprised his role as Jafar for the Broadway version (and still does). The show was nominated for five Tonys, including Best Musical, and won one for James Monroe Igelhart, which makes him the first actor ever to win a Tony for a performance in a Disney show on Broadway. I also had the blessing of getting to meet Mr. Igelhart and receive his autograph. He even agreed to pose for a selfie with me, along with Adam Jacobs and several other members of the cast. Currently, Adam Jacobs’s sister, Arielle Jacobs is playing the role of Jasmine on Broadway. (Arielle originated the role of Gabriella Montez in the Disney’s tour of “High School Musical.”)
• Most recently, on March 22nd, 2018, Disney produced Frozen on Broadway. The show opened at the St. James Theatre and continues its run, receiving three Tony Nominations, including Best Musical. The live show features a slightly different plot from the film (i.e. the song “Let it Go,” takes place after the songs “Reindeers Are Better Than People,” and “In Summer,” and The Duke of Weselton is credited as just “Weselton” in the show, and he is younger than he appears in the film). The show features music by Robert and Kristin Anderson-Lopez and the librettist is Jennifer Lee who co-directed the original 2013 film with Chris Buck. While the stage version didn’t win, Lee, Buck, and the Lopezes all won Oscars for their contributions to the film (the Lopezes for Best Original Song “Let it Go,” and Lee and Buck for Animated Feature Film, along with Peter Del Vecho as Producer). Each of the above have reunited for Disney’s upcoming sequel to Frozen, Frozen II which will be released on November 22nd, 2019.   

Disney has had a great track record on Broadway for a quarter of a century, and with the development of shows such as Father of the Bride, Alice in Wonderland, and Bambi, more great shows should be on their way soon.  

Disney on Broadway Part 1!

On February 8th 1993, Ron Logan, a former executive vice president of Walt Disney Entertainment, founded the Walt Disney Theatrical Group (now better known as Disney Theatrical Group). In the 26 years since its founding, the group has produced a total of 12 shows on Broadway and numerous national tours, along with some non-Broadway original shows. I thought we could explore interesting facts about what the Great White Way’s adaptations of classic Disney stories. Please feel free to comment on anything you find interesting. 

• The very first Disney film adapted for Broadway was Beauty and the Beast. The show premiered at the Palace Theatre on April 18th, 1994. It played a total of 5,461 performances, from 1994-2007, and won a Tony Award for Best Costume Design. Terrence Mann, Susan Egan, and Gary Beach, who originated the respective roles of the Beast, Belle, and Lumiere, all received Tony Nominations for their performances in the show. (Egan, would later be hired by the Walt Disney Studios again to provide the voice of Megara or “Meg” in Hercules (1997)). 
• Two months after “Beauty and the Beast” premiered on Broadway, Disney released their original film adaptation of The Lion King on June 24th. “Lion King,” would get its Broadway treatment three years later on November 13th, 1997 at the New Amsterdam Theatre and is currently playing today at the Minskoff Theatre. The original company won six Tony Awards, including Best Musical. It also starred Samuel E. Wright in the role of Mufasa, and he received a Tony Nomination for his performance. Ironically, Wright had previously voiced Sebastian in The Little Mermaid (1989) nearly a decade earlier.
• The same year that “Lion King,” premiered on Broadway, Sir Tim Rice, who collaborated with Alan Menken on the film version of Aladdin (1992) as well as the Broadway version of “Beauty and the Beast,” collaborated with Alan Menken on King David, which is a concert—not a fully staged musical—based on the Bible Story of David. The show opened at the New Amsterdam Theatre and played for a total of only nine performances. The cast featured Roger Bart as David’s friend Jonathan, and Judy Kuhn as Michal, David’s first wife. Bart is known at Disney for having been the singing voice of Hercules in Hercules (1997) and Kuhn is known at Disney for being the singing voice of Pocahontas in Pocahontas (1995). 
• The first Disney Theatrical Group show to open outside the U.S. was The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It opened at the Musical Theater Berlin in Berlin, Germany, on June 5th, 1999 and closed in June 2002. A readapted version played at the La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego, California and ran from October 28th-December 7, 2014. Directed by Scott Schwartz, son of Stephen Schwartz, in collaboration with Alan Menken and was later transferred to the Paper Mill Playhouse where it ran from March 4th to April 5th, 2015. In 2017, the Berlin version reopened, transferring to Stuttgart in 2018.
• After Sir Elton John and Sir Tim Rice won well-deserved Oscars and Tonys for the Film and Broadway adaptations of “Lion King,” Disney was eager to rehire the pair for another project and they originally considered producing the opera of Aida as an animated movie-musical. It was Sir John, however, who convinced them to produce it directly as a stage musical, and Rice agreed. “Aida” premiered at the Palace Theatre on March 23rd, 2000 and played a total of 1,852 performances. It won four Tonys including Best Original Musical Score for John and Best Actress in a Musical for Heather Hedley who portrayed the title role in the show, and who had previously originated the role of Nala in “Lion King,” on Broadway.  
• Disney’s Tarzan opened at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on May 10th, 2006. Although the show managed to run over a year, it was critically a flop, failed to sell enough tickets, and only played 486 performances. Despite these failures on Broadway, the show later moved to the Netherlands where it ran for two years, and then Sweden where it played for one year, and then Germany where it played for ten years from 2008-2018. The show was also revived for the Tuachan Center for the Arts in Ivins, Utah where it ran from June-October 2010 and The Muny in St. Louis, Missouri where it ran from June-July 2014.
• In 2004, Disney Theatrical produced On the Record, a musical revue which featured an extraordinary range of music from Disney films, Disney shows on Broadway, and even Disneyland Attractions. The show toured for nine months, premiering in Cleveland, Ohio in 2004 and closing in Denver, Colorado in mid-2005. This wasn’t based on any specific plot, but it did feature two male leads and two female leads, one of whom was Ashley Brown. Brown would later become one of many actresses to succeed Susan Egan in the role of Belle in “Beauty and the Beast,” and after that she originated the title role in Disney’s next theatrical adaptation, Mary Poppins.

This brings us to the intermission of Disney on Broadway! More to come in next week’s blog.