Once the curtain, and the guillotine, fell Sept. 18 on A Tale of Two Cities — once the rabble on stage took their bows for restoring Liberte! Egalite! Fraternite! to the land — the audience at the Al Hirschfeld broke en masse and made a mad dash by bus, train and town car for Wall Street, where the monied American aristocrats used to hang out, for a little post-show boogieing at Cipriani's lower Manhattan branch.

The new Broadway musical A Tale of Two Cities will open tonight, September 18th at the Al HirschfeldTheatre.

Musical theatre fans hungry for show tunes to be sung in a romantic, historical world will be fed by A Tale of Two Cities, the new musical by Jill Santoriello, opening Sept. 18 at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre

Producers Barbra Russell and Ron Sharpe, acting alumni of Les Misérables, dove into the talent pool of that Tony winner to castA Tale of Two Cities.

The new musical of the Charles Dickens' classic,A Tale of Two Cities, prepares for its Broadway opening on stage at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre.

From a producer’s point of view, now might be just about the best of times to float a Broadway musical based on “A Tale of Two Cities,” the Charles Dickens classic. With the long-running show “Les Misérables” safely in mothballs, the niche is wide open for a tuneful epic of injustice and retribution played out against the backdrop of France in chaos.

 Nick Wyman starred as Monsieur Firmin in the Original Broadway Cast of The Phantom of the Opera. His other Broadway credits include Les Miserables, Sly Fox, My Fair Lady, the Magic Show and On the Twentieth Century. In A Tale of Two Cities he stars as John Barsad. As the fourth interview in an ongoing series of BWW TV features with the cast of the new Broadway bound musical, he reveals his long history with the production, the excitement of developing an original character over time and how the show continues to inspire.

Broadway star James Barbour and his wife Dana Stackpole are first-time parents, having welcomed a daughter on on Aug. 29. Hudson Barbour weighed in at 8 lbs 6 oz. and was born "beautiful and healthy" says the 42-year-old star of A Tale of Two Cities. Like many first babies, however, Hudson was slow to make an entrance to the world. Recalls James,
 

Previewing in a huge Broadway musical is stressful enough, but James Barbour, star of A Tale of Two Cities, has a happier reason for losing sleep: His wife, actress Dana Stackpole, gave birth just before Labor Day to the couple's first child, daughter Hudson. Juggling rehearsals, performances and diaper duty could make anybody look downright Dickensian, and yes, Barbour is tired, but he's on the home stretch of Tale's long journey to Broadway, "living the dream," as he puts it, as literary ruffian Sydney Carton. Although the 42-year-old actor—whose Broadway credits include another classic hero, Edward Rochester in Jane Eyre, plus leading roles inAssassins, Beauty and the Beast, Urinetown and Carousel—has had some well-publicized ups and downs in the past few years, he keeps the conversation upbeat, expressing gratitude for his life and career (and offering spot-on imitations of Alan Rickman and other British stage stars) over a casual lunch in the theater district.

It could be the best of times; it might be the worst of times. No, really.

A musical adaptation of"A Tale of Two Cities" - think "Les Miz" by way of Charles Dickens - kicks off the hectic and ambitious fall season in a couple of weeks. More to the point, the combination of Broadway's boom-time and sudden jitters from Wall Street may turn Dickens' contradictory couplet into the new theme song for commercial theater.

TALE OF TWO CITIES: Opening night: Sept. 18, Al Hirschfeld Theatre

If Jill Santoriello ever writes her autobiography, it'll be a heck of a story - a teenager's dream that never faded, perseverance against ridiculous odds and, finally, the wholly improbable realization of that long-ago fantasy.
 

The challenges of adapting Charles Dickens' sprawling "A Tale of Two Cities" into a stage tuner could make even the most seasoned legit hand think twice before diving in.

Which may explain why the new musical version of "Tale," the first large-scale Rialto offering of the fall, was single-handedly undertaken by a tyro.

It was the best of times, it was the ...

Wait, wait, wait: It is the best of times for Aaron Lazar, whose tale of two cities spans the Jersey Turnpike from Cherry Hill, N.J., to New York, N.Y., with a cherished cherry on top -- Broadway -- where the acclaimed actor is starring as Charles Darnay in a swashbuckling swagger of a musical "A Tale of Two Cities."

Aaron Lazar — who co-stars in the new Broadway musical A Tale of Two Cities — fills out Playbill.com's questionnaire with random facts, backstage trivia and pop culture tidbits.