It Was a Great Week to Be a Musical-Theater Geek

This is a preview of our pop culture newsletter The Daily Beast’s Obsessed, written by editor Kevin Fallon. To receive the full newsletter in your inbox each week, sign up for it here.

This week:

• Grab some tissues and go see The Holdovers.

• A good week to be a Broadway fan in New York.

• What are they doing to Sesame Street?

• I can’t keep laughing about this movie.

• Obsessed is heading to BravoCon!

A Great Week to Be a Broadway Geek

The gay millennial in me was thriving this week. To be fair, I’m always skipping around looking for reasons to be living his best flamboyant life, but the world really staged a pride parade tailored directly to me.

Listen, I’m not sure where we’ve landed in the whole “are you going to be canceled for being a Lea Michele fan” thing. She’s just come off a celebrated, deservedly fawned-over run in Funny Girl added a new chapter to her career, which had been stalled because of reports of her allegedly problematic on-set behavior. But I will not turn down an opportunity to hear her sing—the woman can sing—which is how I found myself at her sold-out Carnegie Hall debut.

It was a supercharged version of a concert she had been touring before joining the cast of Funny Girl, which I may or may not have taken an Amtrak from New York to Philly just to see. Who could say? Think of it as Lea Michele: The Eras Tour, as Michele tells stories about her career, from her first audition for a Broadway show when she was 7 up until scoring the kinds of raves actors dream about while playing Fanny Brice this past year. Each mention of a new milestone gets a new song.

She entered the concert from the back of house, belting “Don’t Rain on My Parade” on her way to the stage, just as she had at the Tony Awards in 2010 when Glee had just finished its smash first season. She stopped halfway down the aisle to sing a verse directly to me! There is an argument to be made that she was perhaps singing to her best friend Jonathan Groff, who was across the aisle from me. But again: Who could say?

Groff joined her on stage for a duet to a mashup of “Touch Me” from Spring Awakening into “Somewhere” from West Side Story, and then performed his “You’ll Be Back” number from Hamilton with retooled, Lea-specific lyrics while Michele went to pee. Her grand finale was “My Man,” the song added to the Funny Girl film for Barbra Streisand, which basically launched the roof of Carnegie Hall over to the spire of the Empire State Building, where it’s apparently still dangling as we speak.

Once a Gleek, always a Gleek—covering the show was a pivotal part of my start as an entertainment journalist—and the Gleek was really Gleeking at this concert.

That the Gershwin Theater was also celebrating the 20th anniversary of Wicked on the same night was wild to me. I am someone who got pulled over by cops while riding in a car with my best friend when I was a junior in high school, because she had been speeding while we screamed along to “Dancing Through Life” on a Wicked karaoke CD while driving home from theater rehearsal.

Wicked, suffice it say, is foundational for me. And, while I can’t believe it’s been 20 years since that encounter with a very confused police officer, I do love that stars Kristin Chenoweth and Idina Menzel have been given this victory lap together after so many years of misogynistic rumors about their friendship. But it seems like Galinda’s “ball gown!” wand still is malfunctioning:

Letters of the Day Are W-T-F

In this edition of “Who Asked for This?”, it seems that Sesame Street is going to get a major retooling for its 56th (!) season. The Hollywood Reporter revealed that the “reimagined” Sesame Street will scrap its tried-and-true magazine-style format for a narrative-driven approach that will stretch across episodes. Because that’s what toddlers famously crave from their entertainment: plots.

And so I look forward to the future episodes where all the muppets rally around Zoe and say they were the ones who cut the LVAT wire, Bert drives Ernie to the woods and wastes him, and Elmo starts cooking meth in his basement.

You’ve got to love the entertainment industry’s devotion to “fixing” things that aren’t broken.

I Can’t Believe This Movie Is Real

There is, frankly, not enough attention being paid to the fact that John Travolta and Katherine Heigl are going to star together in a musical romantic comedy that will be written and directed by the scribe behind Green Book. The title is—wait for it—That’s Amore! (Exclamation point theirs.) Travolta will be playing a man named Nick Venere. And Heigl? Well, her character’s name is Patty Amore, of course.

Obsessed Heads to BravoCon!

This weekend, The Daily Beast’s Obsessed is going to be at BravoCon in Las Vegas, where over 150 Bravo stars will participate in panels, fan meet-and-greets, superstar tapings of Watch What Happens Live, and, inevitably, fight off hangovers. Not only will we have reporters on the ground, but we also will be sending out three special editions of the Obsessed newsletter. Expect recaps of the previous day’s news and shenanigans, scoops from our interviews with the talent there, behind-the-scenes gossip, and wild tales of what it’s like to be amidst the fun—and the mayhem. So be sure to monitor your inbox!

What to watch this week

Priscilla: Does everyone already know that Priscilla Presley was 14 years old when she met Elvis? Yeesh. (Now in theaters)

Quiz Lady: Awkwafina and Sandra Oh are so irresistible, even their mediocre movie is worth watching. (Now on Netflix)

Invincible: It turns out even superheroes suffer from paralyzing parental trauma. (Now on Prime Video)

What to skip this week:

The Marsh King’s Daughter: A transparent attempt to be the next Where the Crawdads Sing-esque hit. (Now in theaters)

What Happens Later: It brings us no pleasure to report that Meg Ryan’s new rom-com is highly disappointing. (Now in theaters)

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