Bad season on Broadway

By William Glover

NEW YORK (4-Broadway is in a production slump and off-Broadway is booming. That's the new theater season, just getting under way.

It could go into the records as the most significant event since the Great White Way became the country's entertainment capital and Gotham's greatest tourist lure.

Between now and the snows of New Year, the traditional midpoint of stage activity, only eight new shows have been definitely booked for Broadway, plus two revivals and the visit by a San Francisco troupe. That is less than one-third of last year's very average pace.

In contrast, 17 exhibits including a couple of palpable hits, already have appeared off-Broadway and 15 more by midseason attest to the creative shift that's going

on.

Last season there were 94 off-Broadway shows.

As matters stand now, a dozen Broadway houses are looking for occupants-a circumstance unprecedented --but every off-Broadway basement or converted church hall is booked, and several more auditoriums are being rehabilitated. This is the Broadway premiere schedule as it now lines up: American Conservatory Theater from San Francisco opens at the ANTA Sept. 29 for a fourweek display including "Tiny Alice," "A Flea in Her Ear" and "The Three Sisters."

“A Patriot for Me,” at the Barrymore, Oct. 2-John Osborne's drama starring Osborne's drama starring Maximilian Schell, Dennis King and Beatrice Straight, about a homosexual officer in the Austrian army before World War I.

"The Front Page," Ambassador, Oct. 11-Helen Hayes stars in another reThe reasons for the alter-vival of the 1924 comedy ing emphasis appear mainly to be: a dearth of promising scripts for big house display; shortage of investment money, partly perhaps because of the stock market

decline, and increasing public unwillingness to pay those rising ticket prices for less than smash attractions.

OFF-Broadway

produc-

tion, after an earlier flareup and decline, has been steadily growing while Broadway endeavor has hung around 55 shows each season this year's trend continues, that total will be about 30.

if

melodrama written by her husband, Charles MacArthur, and Ben Hecht.

"Indians," Atkinson, Oct. 13-Arthur Kopit's free-form drama about what this coun-

try did to the red man; previously played by the Royal Shakespeare Company in England and the Arena Stage in Washington.

"THE PENNY Wars," Royale, Oct. 15-About a 16-year-old boy's adventures in 1939 upstate New York. in 1939 upstate New York. Along with "A Patriot for Me," the only production set for this season so far by

Movie Stardust

Over the Years

By W. Ward Marsh

10 Years Ago Today

"Fast Life” with Douglas

Broadway's sometimes busiest producer, David Merrick.

"Butterflies Are Free," Booth, Oct. 17-Keir Dullea and Maureen O'Sullivan fea ture a story of a blind youth who becomes involved with a hippy neighbor.

"Jimmy," Winter Garden, Oct. 21-The season's first musical, about that rambunctious mayor of New York, James J. Walker.

"Angela," Music Box, Oct. 29-Has Geraldine Page as a 40-year-old Bostonian involved in amour with a 24-year-old TV serviceman.

"The Time of Your Life,' Beaumont, Nov. 6-The Lincoln Center Repertory company launches a season of American lay revivals.

"Coco," Hellinger, Dec. 18-The long-delayed Alan Jay Lerner show, with music by Andrew Previn, and starring Katharine Hepburn. The career of Paris coutourier Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel is the theme.

"Last of the Red Hot Lovers," O'Neill, Dec. 28-Neil Simon comedy about the owner of a seafood restaurant and the women in his life.

""

The off-Broadway upcoming calendar includes: "The American Hamburger League,' a comedy tried in Toronto in 1968, and being presented at the New Theater, Sept. 16. Producer Kermit Bloomgarden offers "Hello and Goodbye," starring Colleen Dewhurst at the Sheridan Square, Sept.

18.

ANOTHER emigre from Broadway, David Black, puts on a rock musical "Salvation" at the Jan Hus, Sept. 24.

Also scheduled are "Cressida," a musical by Galt McGowan who sired the score of "Hair": a completely new version of a revue, "From the Second City"; "Crime of Passion," two plays by England's late Joe Orton; a version of "Fortune and Men's Eyes,"

directed and rewritten by Sal Mineo, and "Rondelay," a musical directed by Cyril Ritchard.