Convention will get the conventional

The conspiracy theorists of Broadway thought they had a good one the other day after the city announced the eight musicals the delegates to the 2004 Republican convention would get to see in August. Not one dealt, overtly at least, with the prickly politics of race, sex, abortion or war.

The people who picked the plays, the theory went, pointedly eliminated anything current from the mix, instead serving up the blandest of Broadway fare. After all, what would conservatives in the GOP think if they knew their delegates were in a darkened theater watching a cross-dresser crooning about segregation (“Hairspray”) or a black maid bemoaning life in the 1960s South (“Caroline, or Change”) or a gay man impersonating Hitler in a show that becomes a smash hit on Broadway (“The Producers”)?

Hot and new was trumped by tried and true. So went the perception. Family friendly won out -- “The Lion King,” “The Phantom of the Opera,” “Beauty and the Beast.” After “Movin’ Out,” the Twyla Tharp/Billy Joel collaboration about Vietnam-era angst, didn’t even make the cut, the producer told the local paper, “I didn’t know we were a left-wing show.”

Yet in all of this, there is less than meets the eye. Perception is not reality, but in cities such as New York and Los Angeles that put a lot of stock in intellectual capital, an idea, even a wrong one, gets up on its own two legs and runs feverishly around town. If nothing else, this so-called plot to shield the delegates illustrates the distrust between Manhattan’s left-leaning intelligentsia and its Republican guests. (Which, by the way, just happens to mirror the nation’s political divide.)

But this is really less about politics than it is about another New York core value: the bottom line.

Kevin Sheekey, head of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s host committee and the man who picked the Broadway shows for the GOP, shot down the conspiracy by invoking his mother, who lives in upstate New York: “When she came to the city, I sent her to see “Wicked” and she loved it,” Sheekey said, referring to the new “Wizard of Oz” musical told from the point of view of the witches. “Why would I not want the delegates to see it?” (In making an argument about Broadway and the GOP, almost everybody interviewed mentioned a visiting mother, as if mothers forever have the last word about what is acceptable.) It also turns out the tour guide for the Republicans visiting New York this summer is ... a Democrat. Before Sheekey went to work for the city’s Democrat-turned-Republican mayor, he was an aide to the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a Democrat.

Sheekey explained that “Movin’ Out” and “Wicked” were eliminated not because of their story lines but because they didn’t fit a formula he established with help from the theater producers’ guild: Theaters had to be large enough to seat a couple of state delegations at one time; producers had to offer at least a 25% discount on tickets for a special 5 p.m. performance Aug. 29, the Sunday before the convention starts; and the shows had to be closed to anyone but the Republicans.

But even under Sheekey’s formula, it doesn’t make sense that “The Producers,” which is in one of the biggest houses on Broadway, didn’t make the list, and “The Lion King,” in as big a house and by far a tougher ticket than even “Hairspray,” did. Sheekey said that the producers of “The Producers” simply weren’t willing to give up the house at a deep discount for one night, and that “The Lion King’s” management was. Margo Lion of “Hairspray” said her sell-out show was in too small of a theater to dedicate the house for a night to one group.

Ultimately, Sheekey said he knew that no matter what shows he chose, he’d be “second-guessed.” He wanted to avoid “playing artistic director for the GOP....That said, obviously, we’re here to entertain. This is a welcome-to-New York event, not a lesson in experimental theater.”

Traditionally, the host cities for political conventions of either party throw a boozy and, many say, boring party for each delegation the night before the convention gavel drops. But the Bloomberg team and the tourist office decided to treat the 13,373 delegates and their guests to a Broadway musical, and quickly found a corporate sponsor, the New York Times Co., to pick up the almost $1-million tab. While the company’s flagship newspaper is not known for Republican-friendly editorials, the company is a booster of Broadway advertisers and New York tourism.

Sheekey admitted he thought about throwing in some dramas and off-Broadway plays but decided it was simpler to have all the delegates go to the same type of show -- a musical. Broadway’s theater guild helped set the criteria, and Sheekey negotiated with each show. “Movin’ Out” came in 13th, in terms of size of the house, on a list of 16 shows willing to make a deal. The top eight were picked: “42nd Street”; “Aida”; “Bombay Dreams”; “The Lion King”; “Fiddler on the Roof”; “The Phantom of the Opera”; “Beauty and the Beast”; “Wonderful Town.”

Missing in action were several new hits sure to rack up 2004 Tony Awards in June such as “Caroline, or Change,” “Avenue Q,” “Wicked,” “The Boy From Oz,” “Assassins.” After reading several snarky media reports about the GOP’s choices, Broadway insiders concluded that the Republicans were once again limiting themselves to the cleanest-cut entertainment.

“The Republicans just didn’t want to see a lot of gay people on stage,” said one prominent Broadway composer. A producer quipped: “If they couldn’t face gays and crazy Jews on stage, why are they coming to New York at all?” (Both asked that their names not be used).

John Weidman, co-author with Stephen Sondheim of the newly revived “Assassins,” could understand why the GOP might have overlooked his show with a singing and dancing John Hinckley Jr. on stage. Still, Weidman was disappointed that the delegates, the majority on their first trip to New York, wouldn’t get a taste of the best live theater but instead would see musicals they could see closer to home when the shows inevitably go on the road.

When Weidman’s mother-in-law came to New York several years ago, he sent her to “Streamers” and she came out of the theater with David Rabe’s foul language ringing in her ears. “It didn’t kill her, it did what good theater does. It offered new information and jolted her.

“I thought there was a dispiriting irony that here we have a political convention coming to New York and the only thing we’re offering are shows that are not political,” said Weidman, who is also president of the Dramatist Guild of playwrights, composers and lyricists. “Theater can be a diversion and entertainment and that’s terrific, but it can also be challenging and provocative and nowhere more so than here. The city is shortchanging itself by not showing off its best.”

Again, it depends on what kind of change you’re talking about. The city really doesn’t seem to care which theaters get filled as long as the delegates open their wallets. Every delegate, in fact, has also received a brochure listing all New York shows, with phone numbers and in many cases discounts for tickets, not only during the convention week but also for the three days before and three days after.

The 343 Republicans coming from California, for example, are being encouraged to participate in the “Come Early, Stay Late” program, and Elizabeth Blackney, media director for the Californians, doesn’t care what type of culture they take in. While she wants the delegates “to take a big bite out of the Big Apple,” she said she isn’t worried that they’ll get a taste of sin city.

“A lot of people want us to believe that New York is a bastion of Democrats and their, uh, ideals,” she said. “New York is everybody’s city and we look forward to sharing it.”

But nevermind Broadway and high or low culture. The best of New York is always found on its streets. If all else fails, just listen to Sondheim, who over a brilliant career has written the soundtrack of this city in many hit shows. While they’re here, the delegates could simply plug into “Company” and listen to the song “Another Hundred People”:

Another hundred people just got

off of the train

And came up through the

ground

While another hundred people

just got off of the bus

And are looking around

At another hundred people who

got off of the plane

And are looking at us

Who got off of the train

And the plane and the bus....