"Contact" was such an anomaly on Broadway that it inspired a new Tony Award category: Best Special Theatrical Event. It was a musical with pre-recorded music and a play with almost no dialogue. The producers called it a "dance play" and there's really been nothing like it since.

I explore the history and ramifications of this fascinating one-off with Julinda Lewis, Ed.D,, who has forgotten more about dance than I'll ever know. We discuss how dancers deal with pre-recorded music, how gestures can mean different things in different countries and many other fun tangents.

Find out more about "Contact" at ChasingPhantom.net and check out the other podcasts in the TimberTodd Pods family at timbertoddpods.com. 

How do you avoid talking about a dreadful show? You invite on a delightful guest! The so-called comedy, "Never Too Late," was a play that ran for an unbelievable 1,007 performances back in the early 1960s, remarkable given the lack of any discernible jokes. My pal, Jesse Rabinowitz, Ph.D., who has forgotten more about old movies than I will ever know, takes what could have been a relentless bashing of this show and expands it into a broader consideration of the evolution of comedy. It's a fast and fun discussion you don't need to be a theater fan to enjoy.

Find out more about "Never Too Late" at ChasingPhantom.net and check out the other podcasts in the TimberTodd Pods family at timbertoddpods.com. 

How the hell did they get away with this? Join me with a only slightly legalistic consideration of what they were thinking when they made "Beatlemania." It opened in 1977 when sadness about the supergroup's breakup was still running high. Not really a musical, the tribute concert was more a multimedia trip through the 1960s. My not-a-lawyer best pal, Randy Evans, chat about the relatively short winding road that this Broadway oddity went down before the real Beatles stopped feuding long enough to take action.

Find out more about "Big River" at ChasingPhantom.net and check out the other podcasts in the TimberTodd Pods family at timbertoddpods.com. 

Join Chasing Phantom for a rollicking ride down "Big River," the 1985 musical based on Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" that ran for 1,005 performances. My buddy, Christopher Haushalter, and I rave about Roger Miller's score, consider whether it's a show that requires racial recontextualization, and remember when John Goodman was just a curly-haired young lunk railing against the "Guv'ment." Chris saw the original production back in the day and recounts his first trip to Broadway back when NYC was a scary den of iniquity instead of a glitzy overpriced tourist destination.

Find out more about "Big River" at ChasingPhantom.net and check out the other podcasts in the TimberTodd Pods family at timbertoddpods.com. 

In the inaugural episode of "Chasing Phantom," I review and reflect on "Newsies," the Disney screen-to-stage adaptation that ran for 1,004 performances. I am joined by Dr. Caroline Weist, a professor at University of Richmond, who augments her "Newsies" fandom with insightful commentary on the differences between the movie and stage versions of the story, while I mostly geek out on how talented Jeremy Jordan is.

Find out more about "Newsies" at ChasingPhantom.net and check out the other podcasts in the TimberTodd Pods family at timbertoddpods.com. 

On April 16th, 2023, the historic run of "Phantom of the Opera" on Broadway will end just shy of 14,000 performances. While the next closest show will need to run at least 9 more years to catch it, the door is now open for some other production to eventually surpass this incredible number. "Chasing Phantom" will look at those contenders, in addition to the more than 100 other Broadway productions that have run for more than 1,000 performances. Join your host, David Timberline, theater critic and arts feature writer for Style Weekly, as he invites experts, friends and theater fans to weigh in on some of Broadway's best...or at least most popular. 

Episodes drop every 2 weeks starting April 12th, 2023.