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Power Play

The next time you're watching a smash Broadway show, keep in mind that some of the biggest New York stars are the ones you never see.   
. Photograph by Chad Windham.


Who's in charge here?
Walk outside onto one of Broadway's side streets, look up at the theater marquee, and, suddenly and loudly, a question ricochets: Who's calling the shots? One theater is playing Mamma Mia!, a musical based on 30-year-old disco songs by the Swedish group ABBA, while, nearby, another is showing Butley, a 35-year-old play about an English professor's oh-so-British midlife crisis. (It's starring box-office fave Nathan Lane and is enjoying a Broadway revival.) A few doors down is The Coast of Utopia, a Tom Stoppard play about the lead-up to the Russian revolution. And then there is The Faith Healer, a gossamer Brian Friel play about a murder in an Irish pub.

Do these productions have anything in common - anything at all?

In fact, they do. Broadway comprises 39 stages, and the reality is that only a handful of people decide what gets staged, what closes, and what will never open. You don't know their names; they aren't actors or actresses, and they don't appear on magazine covers. They are directors, producers, and writers, and when they shine a green light on a play, it happens - on Broadway and in the leading Off-Broadway houses. Read on to meet five of the most powerful people on Broadway (plus several others who are part of the exclusive club).