A Guide to the Ides
How well I remember March 15, 2002. My buddy Ken Bloom drove up to my apartment building at 8am to drive me to the airport. He had more than just a ride for me, though; he had word of the reviews for the musical that had just opened the night before: Sweet Smell of Success.
“They’re mostly awful,” he said as we made our way to the airport. We felt pretty bad about that, not only because we admired so much of the musical but also because our friend Frank Vlastnik was in the cast. He’d literally waited years for the show to get on, and now it looked as if it would be off pretty soon. We both wondered what we’d say to him when we next encountered him. Neither one of us was looking forward to talking with Frank for — to paraphrase a lyric from Merrily We Roll Along — with reviews that bad, what can anyone say? That’s when Ken’s cell phone rang. He looked at it, saw the displayed number, and said, “It’s Frank, but it’s illegal for me to use a cell phone while driving. You’ll have to talk to him.”
Oh, great! Thanks! “Hi, Frank,” I said listlessly, and then Frank quoted a line form Julius Caesar in an ominous tone: “Beware the Ides of March.” Indeed, that’s what it precisely was. Ever since then, I’ve been meaning to check to see if shows that were reviewed on March 15 — or opened on that date — had a harder time of it than shows that chose other days to open or be reviewed. Now that both days are upon us, let’s have a look.
Interestingly enough, the first entry in the Internet Broadway Database for a March 14 opening is Julius Caesar in 1794. But back then, I’m sure the technology wasn’t there to get the reviews into the following day’s papers. So let’s move to 1904, where Shakespeare is again represented, albeit with Much Ado About Nothing. The title may have been the producer’s subtle comment on the alleged curse of the Ides of March; on the other hand, this Much Ado ran only 16 performances, so maybe there’s something to the whammy. In 1916, yet another Shakespeare — Henry VIII — that opened on the 14th made it to 63 performances. (That’s 10½ performances for each of Henry’s wives.) In between, Ibsen’s plays were tried twice — Brand in 1910, and Ghosts in 1912. Neither ran, but Ibsen rarely ever does on Broadway. Nine other March 14 openings in that span are titles that mean nothing to us today.
Then comes a work by George Atkinson, who not only wrote but produced a play that would be reviewed on the Ides of March in 1921. It was called The Survival of the Fittest but it wasn’t fit enough to survive more than two weeks. (Who said that ambition should be made of sterner stuff?) The next eight shows to open over the next 23 years aren’t ones that I’ve heard of, either. Not until 1944 is there a title I recognize:
Jacobowsky and the Colonel. S.N. Behrman’s comedy is one of the few properties to be renamed for both its movie version (Me and the Colonel) and its musical version (The Grand Tour). Many a play opening today would envy Jacobowsky’s 417-performance run. I guess its Ides of March reviews must have been pretty good! Anyway, it’s the first real winner out of all the above.
Two years later, audiences saw the March 14-opening Dark of the Moon, in which a forest “witch-boy” falls in love with a village woman but can’t win her unless he finds a way to become human. It’s hardly a work of art, but the play was quite popular in community theater for the next 15 years before falling terribly out of fashion. Then, in 1970, it was unexpectedly revived Off-Broadway. Why? Because a producer decided that, with nudity in vogue, he could have the witch-boy and a few of his pals romp around in the buff. Still, few theatergoers wanted to see it and it closed after 10 weeks. Rue McClanahan was in it, but I don’t think she stripped. By the way, the show played at the Mercer Arts Center, the roof of which literally fell in in 1973, causing the place to be condemned. It was best known as the original home of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, the Pulitzer Prize winner that had a smash two-year-plus run there. Marigolds had a Broadway revival in 1978 but it was a big flop. On what day did its producers read the lackluster reviews? March 15, of course.
Speaking of community theater, Springtime for Henry — the stalwart farce that was produced in every small town in the ’30s — got pretty rotten reviews when it was revived on March 14, 1951 and played all of 53 performances, essentially a quarter of its original 1931 run. But another show destined for a long and happy community theater life received virtually unanimous raves on March 15, 1975: Same Time, Next Year.
And what of productions that actually opened on March 15? Thirty-four shows have braved that date, starting with She Stoops to Conquer in 1773 (when we still belonged to England). The list includes another Julius Caesar, which lasted one night in 1918. Of all the March 15th openings, this was the most unkindest cut of all. (Notice that the current Julius Caesar, the 19th revival in Broadway history, is patiently waiting until April 3 to officially open.)
Still, in comparison to the March 14 openings, the March 15ths bestride the narrow world like a Colossus: Juno and the Paycock (1926), New Faces of 1934, The Consul (1950), No Strings (1962), Purlie (1970), Mark Twain Tonight (1977), and Starlight Express (1987) met with varying degrees of success, but all were successful nevertheless. Oh, and there’s one more I should mention:
My Fair Lady, which debuted on March 15, 1956. Guess that proves once and for all that if your show is good enough, you don’t have to beware the Ides of March.
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[To contact Peter Filichia directly, e-mail him at pfilichia@theatermania.com]
