Neil Diamond bio-musical to debut in Boston in 2022
A musical featuring the songs — and telling the life story — of Neil Diamond now has a title, a choreographer and scheduled performance dates in Boston, with Broadway plans next.
“A Beautiful Noise,” a nod to the singer-songwriter’s 1976 album, is set to run for four weeks at the Emerson Colonial Theatre in Boston next summer, the show’s producers, Ken Davenport and Bob Gaudio, announced Tuesday. They plan to bring the production to New York following that run.
“I personally hope that this announcement demonstrates to the world that the Broadway factory is starting to come back to life, that there is smoke coming from our chimneys,” Davenport said in an interview Tuesday. “We’re starting to make stuff again. We may not be able to show it to everyone right now, but we will.”
The show, first announced in 2019, has put together a marquee team: The director is Michael Mayer, who won a Tony Award in 2007 for “Spring Awakening.”
“A Beautiful Noise” will cover the ups and downs of Diamond’s life, from growing up poor in Brooklyn through his rise to stardom in the ’70s (thanks to hits like “Cracklin’ Rosie” and “Song Sung Blue”) and into the later decades of his career, when he became something of a living legend.
‘Jeopardy!’ contestant riffs on Packers during Rodgers’ hosting stint
Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers got quite the surprise in his first episode as a guest host of “Jeopardy!”
Contestant Scott Shewfelt was stumped on the final question of the episode that aired Monday. He decided to reply by referencing a controversial Packers strategic decision in last season’s NFC championship game as he wrote, “Who wanted to kick that field goal?”
The Packers trailed the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 3123 and had fourth-andgoal at the 8-yard line with just over two minutes when they opted to kick a field goal rather than going for the touchdown. Mason Crosby made the field goal, but the Bucs took the kickoff and maintained possession the rest of the way to win 31-26.
When Shewfelt’s question appeared on the screen, Rodgers paused before saying, “That is a great question. It should be correct, but unfortunately for this game today, it’s incorrect.” The “Jeopardy!” Twitter account later posted a behind-the-scenes video in which Rodgers told Shewfelt, “I can see (your answer) out on the podium, and I was, like, ‘Please put something about the field goal on there. You will always be all-time in my book, my friend.’”
When Rodgers had been asked about the field-goal decision after the game, he said, “I didn’t have a decision on that one.” Rodgers later added, “That wasn’t my decision, but I understand the thinking, above two minutes with all of our timeouts, but it wasn’t my decision.”
Rodgers is hosting “Jeopardy!” through April 17 for the next two weeks as the show goes through a series of guest hosts to replace Alex Trebek, who died of cancer on Nov. 8.