For 'Poppins,' Disney Has Done Its Chicago "Homework"

I mentioned earlier about the musical stage version of Mary Poppins on Broadway recouping money for its investors. An additional piece of information out of that news piece was the announcement that Chicago will be the first city for the touring version of Mary Poppins. It seems that there's a bit of history with regards to Disney's touring company and Chicago.

As long-time observers of the downtown theater scene here know, Disney made a 1999 deal that kept the tour of "The Lion King" out of Chicago for years. At the request of Toronto presenters, Disney agreed to give the Canadian city the territory that included Chicago. Since "The Lion King" was by far the hottest show of that era, the agreement infuriated the local theater-going public. In this newspaper, then-theater critic Richard Christiansen called the deal "a great big bonehead miscalculation."

"Lion King" didn't finally arrive here for three more years. That's not a miscalculation anybody—least of all Schumacher’s savvy Disney—would make anymore.

I certainly hope not. It was quite strange, really, with that "Lion King" debacle, because the city has proven with the long-running Beauty and the Best at the Chicago theater that it can give Disney a big hit. So it wasn't as if the city is an unchartered water. So I guess that was the part that was the "... great big bonehead miscalculation". :)

Zz.