Razzle Dazzle: The Battle for Broadway

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Description

The story of the upward push, fall, and redemption of Broadway—its stars, its biggest shows, its producers, and the entire drama, intrigue, and power plays that happened in the back of the scenes—“unfolds faster than a curtain going up on opening night….A will have to read” (Kevin Spacey).

“A wealthy, lovely, debut history of New York theater in the 1970s and eighties” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), Razzle Dazzle is a narrative account of the people and the money and the power that turned New York’s gritty back alleys and sex-shops into the glitzy, dazzling Great White Way.

In the mid-1970s Times Square was once the seedy symbol of New York’s economic decline. Its once shining star, the renowned Shubert Organization, was once losing theaters to make way for parking lots and losing money. Bernard Jacobs and Jerry Schoenfeld, two ambitious board members, saw the crumbling company was once ripe for takeover and staged a coup and staved off corporate intrigue, personal betrayals and criminal investigations. Once Jacobs and Schoenfeld solidified their power, they turned a collapsed theater-owning holding company into one of the vital successful entertainment empires on the earth, spearheading the revitalization of Broadway and the renewal of Times Square.

“For those interested in the business in the back of the greasepaint, at a riveting time in Broadway’s and New York’s history, this is the ticket” (USA TODAY). Michael Riedel tells the stories of the Shubert Organization and the shows that re-built a city in grand style—including Cats, A Chorus Line, and Mamma Mia!—revealing the behind the curtain drama that incessantly rivaled what transpired onstage, exposing bitter rivalries, unlikely alliances, and inside gossip. “The trouble with Razzle Dazzle isyou can’t put the damn thing down” (Huffington Post).

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