Believe it or not, there are a few notable Jan. 1 opening nights.
Forty-five Minutes from Broadway, which opened at the New Amsterdam in 1906. A half-century before The Dick Van Dyke Show, New Rochelle's claim to fame was being mocked in this George M. Cohan musical. Eventually the town got over their hurt feelings.
Courtesy YouTube.
The Shoemaker's Holiday, which opened at the now-demolished Mercury in 1938. Orson Welles directed this Thomas Dekker play, first performed in 1599. Joseph Cotten led the '30s production, playing a common man who threatens to disrupt society by marrying the Lord Mayor's daughter.
The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore, which opened in 1964 at what is now the Lena Horne. This was the second and last Broadway production to date of Tennessee Williams' play about a dying wealthy woman (Tallulah Bankhead) who invites in a poet known as the "Angel of Death" (Tab Hunter). A year earlier, the leads were Hermoine Baddeley and Paul Roebling. While Milk Train once again flopped, it does have a legacy with the 1968 Elizabeth Taylor-Richard Burton film Boom!
Courtesy YouTube.
Next week, she did country, pop, rock -- and then Broadway.
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