i’m one of those people that reads junk mail why? because there’s something entertaining
about them from the credit cards, to political mailers, to local grocers offering you coupons
you know how some people can tell that it’s going to rain because they can sense it the
weight of the air and how it feels and the smell of the landscape i can detect the change
of the seasons by the type of mail that comes into my mailbox for example once the political
mailers come in, you know it’s election season and then you know it’s time for spring
cleaning once the furniture catalogues come in this week however, something very special
came in the mail something signifying the times are truly a changing today, i got a
mailer advertising a broadway show yes, that’s right broadway is coming back to new york
city! and i have the harbinger to prove it there are 41 broadway theaters in new york
city and as of filming 36 of them are open and running, with so many options to choose
from where do you begin in choosing which broadway performance to watch? so in this
video, we are going to talk about how to choose a broadway show to watch because as they say,
the hardest part of making a decision is making a decision but before anything else, welcome
my name is thea and you are watching urban caffeine where we talk about life and survival
in new york city because as we know life does not come with a standard issue manual, certain
chapters of it are available on youtube if this is the first video of mine that you are
seeing, i invite you to check out my channel to see other videos of new york city and if
you are a returning viewer, thank you so much for coming back let’s celebrate by hitting
that like button so, let’s talk broadway by definition a broadway theater is theater
that sits over 500 people and is located in the theater district except for one theater
that is located in the lincoln center an off-broadway theater sits less than 500 people and doesn’t
necessarily have to be in the theater district and an off-off-broadway sits less than 100
people and are scattered all over new york city off-off broadways are a fun experience
themselves there’s something charming and intimate about going to a theater with only
30 other people whether it’s broadway, off broadway, or off off broadway, each of these
theater sizes have their own appeal but when it comes to broadway as mentioned earlier
36 of the 41 broadway theaters are running and have performances so this means there
are no shortage of options so where do we even begin here are a couple of considerations
there are performances on broadway that have been around for ages think the lion king,
wicked, phantom of the opera etcetera so here are my thoughts on these long-running productions
and by long-running i mean something about 2 years or older if you’ve never seen a
live theater performance or you’ve just gotten into it but haven’t really cultivated
your own personal palette of preference when it comes to live theater or live performances,
then a long-running production might be a safe bet they are after all long-running for
a reason my analogy for this is that if you are in a foreign country and you want coffee
and the language barrier and the culture is just too much to deal with, you can always
go to a starbucks a starbucks is dependable and you know what to expect it may or may
not blow your mind, but you will not leave disappointed but, if you consider yourself
a connoisseur of acting and live performances and you’re nit-picky casting and delivery
of the musical score, then a long-running production that’s over 2 years might not
be your cup of tea don’t get me wrong, these shows are performed by talented casts, but
the difference is that when these performances premiered, the original casts put something
of themselves into the production that contributed to the success of the show and some of these
productions are on their third fourth maybe even fifth casting and the newer casts are
expected to recreate that something the original cast put into the show so in a way it can
sound a little bit dull or formulaic if you’re very used to watching live performances the
tony awards is named after mary antoinette perry, a woman renowned in the theater arts
if the academy awards or oscars are for film, the emmy awards for television, and the grammy
awards for music, then the tony awards are for broadway productions and performances
but you don’t necessarily have to pay attention to the winners of the tony awards there times
when the winners of tony awards have been questioned in the past what you need to pay
attention to are the nominations because to be nominated for a tony is a big deal and
a well-respected achievement in the theater industry because nominations chosen by distinguished
theater professionals, those whose opinions matter a lot in the theater world so therefore
performances that have tony nominations are worth looking into because they are basically
vetted for by those who know a thing or two about quality theater tony nominations are
selected in may and awarded in the fall so here’s a tip for you once tony nominations
are released in may, it’s better to watch them before the awards are given in the fall
because once a production has a tony award, tickets might go up in price or they will
probably go up in price off broadways and off-off broadways tend to be more affordable
than broadways but they can be a hit or miss but it’s on these off-broadway stages that
you will find the hidden gems if you are into indie films and productions then you might
want to look into off- and off-off-broadway performances just because an off-broadway
performance doesn’t expand to a broadway theater, doesn’t mean it’s terrible or
not worth seeing as i said earlier, each theater has their own charm and appeal to pick a performance
on an off broadway or off off broadway stage, i usually refer to critics in the new york
times and new york magazine or my friends who have a lot better palette for live performances
than i do ---- i was going to include a segment in this video on how to get deals on broadways
and off broadways because there are several ways on how to do that the whole time i’ve
lived in new york, i have rarely paid full price on broadways and off broadways because
there are several ways of getting affordable tickets for example, there’s a program where
if you’re under 35 years old, you can get $30 tickets for two or if you go to a theater
20 minutes before an off broadway starts then you can get tickets for $20 unfortunately,
after a year of being closed, broadways are still trying to figure it out new york is
still trying to figure it out we’re all trying to figure it out but i will come back
to this topic in the future, i plan to make a video that talks about how to get good deals
on broadway and off-broadway performances so subscribe and stay tuned for future videos
if there’s a broadway show that you are dying to watch right now, comment down below
i would love to hear what it is with that, thank you so much for watching don’t forget
to hit that thumbs up if you liked this video, feel free to share this video with someone
you know who loves broadway just as much until next time, happy new yorking