This Week on Broadway for November 14, 2010: We Open in Venice So Elf-you!

Notes and links for the podcast. Panel: Peter Filichia James Marino Matthew Murray Michael Portantiere NPR, BroadwayStars new book on Sweeney Todd, Forbidden Broadway Behind the mylar curtain Topics: Broadway The Merchant of Venice - The Broadhurst Theatre Elf - Al Hirschfeld Theatre Broadway builds 'Elf' esteem Adaptation aims to be a gift that keeps on giving By ROBERT HOFLER Women On The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown - Belasco Theatre The Pee-Wee Herman Show - Stephen Sondheim Theatre -------------- Listener Jack Lechner teaches about copyright and public domain as part of his NYU film class, and wanted to clarify the situation as it pertains to PORGY AND BESS. U.S. copyright law says that anything published before 1/1/1923 is in the public domain. (Examples: the Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern shows, or George M. Cohan, or the early Irving Berlin.) Anything published between 1923 and 1977 is copyrighted for 95 years from publication, assuming that all the correct forms were filled out at the correct times. So: PORGY AND BESS (1935) will enter the public domain in 2030. DuBose Heyward's novel PORGY (1925) will enter the public domain in 2020; and the straight play version (1927) in 2022. OKLAHOMA! (1943) will enter the public domain in 2038. The next batch of shows to enter the public domain will be the crop of 1923 (e.g. POPPY) -- in 2018. Explicit: No Music: The entrance music is "We Open in Venice" from the original cast recording of Kiss Me, Kate, and the exit music is "In Buddy's Eyes" from the original cast recording of Follies.