Kid-Friendly Musicals

Taking the Kids to a Broadway Musical
Eileen Ogintz

I can see why the first lady Michelle Obama brought her girls and her mom to see a Broadway Musical. It's terrific when you can be entertained and teach the kids an important lesson about history at the same time. The performances are first rate as are the sets, costumes and, of course, the music

Saunders writing Spice Girls show
TV comedienne Jennifer Saunders is to write the story for musical Viva Forever - based on the songs of the Spice Girls.

Hogan given leave to return to US
Crocodile Dundee star Paul Hogan reaches an agreement with tax authorities in Australia allowing him to return to his home in the US.

Majority 'agree with arts change'
Two-thirds of people agree with the government stance on cutting arts funding and relying more on private cash, a survey suggests.

BBC defends Thompson No 10 visit
The BBC denies the director general compromised its independence by visiting Downing Street to discuss coverage of the government's spending cuts.

Cheryl Cole 'to be given divorce'
X Factor judge Cheryl Cole will reportedly be granted a divorce from her footballer husband Ashley in a court hearing on Friday.

Blair memoirs 'break sale record'
Tony Blair's memoirs, based on his time as the prime minister, break sales records, booksellers say.

Talent contestant denied tribunal
A former Britain's Got Talent hopeful who claimed she was discriminated against at an audition fails to get her case taken to an employment tribunal.

Bob Dylan art debuts in Denmark
Some of musician Bob Dylan's artwork, never seen before by the public, is to be displayed at Denmark's National Gallery.

Singer Sami urges Pakistan relief
British singer-songwriter Sami Yusuf, billed as "Islam's biggest rock star", is donating profits from his latest single to help flood victims in Pakistan.

Pepper and Piano set for top five
The UK's first talent show to make music available for download immediately propels a little known act called Pepper and Piano into the charts.

Back... but not for long as Madeley rescues show
Ex-This Morning host Richard Madeley presents the first five minutes of the show while Eamonn Holmes is stuck in traffic.

"One more bottle and we go home," Axl tells Dublin
Guns N' Roses have walked off stage at a gig in Dublin after being booed and having bottles thrown at them by the crowd.

Museum reopens after £2m pledge
A south London museum that closed for three years is officially reopened after philanthropists pledged £2m to save it.

Rare Roman lantern found in field
A metal detecting enthusiast finds what is believed to be the only intact Roman lantern made out of bronze ever discovered in Britain.

Low-key reopening for RSC theatre
The revamped Shakespeare company theatres are to have a low-key reopening, the RSC says.

Portman launches Venice film gala
Natalie Portman attends the opening of the Venice Film Festival, which launched with her film Black Swan.

Zeta Jones reveals cancer anger
Catherine Zeta Jones reveals she is "furious" that doctors failed to detect husband Michael Douglas' throat cancer earlier.

Binoche dismisses Depardieu slur
Oscar-winner Juliette Binoche hits back at the "violence" of criticism by fellow French actor Gerard Depardieu.

Rapper TI is arrested for drugs
Rapper TI and his wife Tameka Cottle are arrested in Hollywood for drug possession, police confirm.

Apple launches MySpace challenger
Apple launches a music-based social network called Ping as part of its latest upgrade to the iTunes music software.

Sony rolls out rival to iTunes
Sony has unveiled its own music and video download in an announcement timed to coincide with an Apple media event.

Corrie to go live for anniversary
Coronation Street is to broadcast a live episode as part of its 50th anniversary celebrations, soap bosses confirm.

Miliband story dramatised on film
Channel 4 dramatises the rise of Labour party leadership candidates David and Ed Miliband, it is announced.

Recovering Cracknell is due home
Olympic medallist James Cracknell is expected home later this week, after fracturing his skull in a bike accident in the US.

Meet The Author: Sir Terry Pratchett
In the latest in the BBC News Meet The Author interviews, Sir Terry Pratchett discusses I Shall Wear Midnight, the latest in his best-selling Discworld series.

Black Swan opens Venice Film Festival
The 67th Venice Film Festival has opened with the premiere of three films, including the thriller Black Swan, starring Natalie Portman.

Tunnel season for Spacey's Vic
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Writer 'missed' Shopaholic character
Writer Sophie Kinsella has described how she missed the main character of her best-selling ''Shopaholic'' series and how she seemed ''real'' to her.

Alesha confirms return to Strictly
We get the dirt from the dancefloor from Alesha Dixon as she confirms she will still be a panellist in the new series of Strictly.

Zeta Jones' fury plus more showbiz
Catherine Zeta Jones says she's "furious" over her husband's cancer, Natalie Portman's Black Swan opens Venice and the rest of the day's showbiz news

Never eat fish on a Monday?
The BBC speaks to Anthony Bourdain who returns with his long awaited sequel Medium Raw, taking stock of the changes in his life and in the culinary world.

James May: 'I was The Stig'
James May mischievously reveals to Richard Bacon that he also held the position of The Stig for five years.

Musician creates bridge symphony
Nick Franglen is using London Bridge and its human traffic to create a 24-hour piece of music

Price of fame
X Factor's Olly Murs attempts leap from talent show runner-up to pop star

Hitting the books
Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan re-launch their book club

'Edgy town'
Canada provides backdrop for Kerouac's On The Road

The Stig
A profile of Ben Collins, the man in the mask

Breakfast TV quiz
Seven questions on Roland, Lizzie and morning sofas

Once Around the Park, Then Farewell
Getting ready to leave New York, but already missing the High Line, the Shakespeare Garden and more.

Time Marches ... Backward!
The Museum of Modern Art and TCM are revisiting “The March of Time” series, short films created from 1935 to 1951 that examine foreign affairs and social issues.

Movie Review | 'Going the Distance': Nothing Keeps Them Apart Except a Continent
In “Going the Distance,” Drew Barrymore and Justin Long are young lovers struggling through a cross-country romance.

Flouting the Mainstream, Forgoing a Corporate Stamp
This weekend’s All Tomorrow’s Parties music festival in Monticello, N.Y., promises to be hugely loud and, as always, sponsor free.

Art Review: Antics Aside, a Dalí of Constant Ambition
An exhibition counters the notion that late work by Dalí is bad, and that most Dalí is late work.

Movie Review | 'Machete': Growl, and Let the Severed Heads Fall Where They May
Robert Rodriguez’s splatter comedy “Machete” is a live-action comic book with roots in the pungent swamp of 1970s B movies.

'Yank!' Won't Reach Broadway This Season
The musical, about two World War II G.I.'s whose friendship turns into romance, has been delayed until the fall of 2011.

Au Revoir, New York. Hello, Paris!
Which way to the Eiffel Tower?

'You Can't Take it With You' Revival Off for Fall
Producer Elizabeth I. McCann, who had announced she would mount the show in November, said on Thursday that she is now aiming for a spring opening.

Art Review: Landscapes Framed by a Chevy
Lee Friedlander’s “America by Car,” opening Saturday at the Whitney Museum, consists of black-and-white photographs taken from inside cars.

Books of The Times: Simon Wiesenthal, the Man Who Refused to Forget
A detailed biography of the legendary Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal shows him to be a complicated hero, an angel with dirty wings.

Movie Review | 'A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop': Remade in China: Coen Brothers’ Tale of Infidelity and Revenge
The director Zhang Yimou honors the unlikely affinity between himself and Joel and Ethan Coen with a remake of their movie “Blood Simple.”

Art Review: A Language Explorer Who Heard Echoes of Africa
Lorenzo Dow Turner dug deep to find many African-inflected elements in the Gullah language and culture.

Vance Bourjaily, Novelist Exploring Postwar America, Dies at 87
Mr. Bourjaily’s novels often explored what it meant to be an American at a particular historical moment.

Cammie King, Scarlett and Rhett’s Girl, Dies at 76
Ms. King played Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler’s ill-fated little girl, Bonnie Blue Butler, in “Gone With the Wind.”

Loving the Lowbrow (It Has Its Own Hall of Fame)
“Bad art” — rescued from trash heaps and thrift shops — has become a genre in itself, with its own fans.

Art Review: The Allure of the Homespun in the Maw of the Digital Age
“Underground Pop,” at the Parrish Art Museum in Southampton, N.Y., highlights the tension between college-trained sophistication and fictions of naïveté.

Theater Review | 'It Must Be Him': Has-Been Writer Hopes to Break Out of a Slump
In “It Must Be Him,” a comedy by Kenny Solms, Peter Scolari plays a television writer who’s trying to revive his career.

Movie Review | 'The Winning Season': Redemption as a Team Sport
An alcoholic finds self-respect as the coach of a high school girls’ basketball team in “The Winning Season.”

Movie Review | 'Last Train Home': A Family Caught in the Wheels of China’s Industrial Locomotive
This documentary by Lixin Fan traces the conflicts between married migrant factory workers in Guangzhou and their daughter, strains partly resulting from China’s accelerating economy.

Antiques: Furniture as Sculpture: A Craftsman’s Legacy
An exhibition about the Pennsylvania carver and sculptor Wharton Esherick, known for his mid-20th-century undulating furniture, opens on Sept. 7 in galleries at the University of Pennsylvania.

Movie Review | 'Etienne!': Rodent Road Trip and Human Bonds
A boy loses his rodent and finds a girl in “Etienne!,” a sunny-sweet fable about healing wounds with the balm of the open road.

Movie Review | 'Our Beloved Month of August': A Film Within a Film
The Portuguese director Miguel Gomes blurs the line between nonfiction and fiction.

Movie Review | 'Clear Blue Tuesday': A Post-9/11 Pop Musical
The film about living in New York post-9/11, is earnest and well meaning and, while dangerously sentimental at times, never quite crosses the line into maudlin.

Movie Review | 'Prince of Broadway': A Street Hustler Becomes a Reluctant Father
Like its subject, the movie is sharp, charismatic and so light on its feet we never know which way it will turn.

Movie Review: ‘Max Manus’
“Max Manus” is a solidly acted biopic of World War II derring-do.

Movie Review: White Wedding
The bungled wedding story and the road movie collide happily in “White Wedding.”

The Tipsy Diaries: The Kitchen Sink in Your Drink
It’s an infuse-a-palooza out there, as infused spirits make serious headway in bars and restaurants of all kinds.

Urban Athlete: Chorus-Line Calisthenics
For beginning hoofers or advanced, Broadway dance routines can be an alternative to the gym.

A Miniature-Golf Odyssey (Obstacles Included)
A tour of miniature-golf courses among the five boroughs.

Educational Deals this Weekend
Free superhero-fueled tutoring in Brooklyn, gardening classes for Young Sprouts near Battery Park and Sunday night fun on the Lower East Side.

House Tour: New Preston, Conn.
On Lake Waramaug, a converted boathouse has a stone foundation, a wraparound deck and direct access to the water.

Arts & Leisure Preview: The Unfinished Tale of an Unlikely Hero
Harvey Pekar, the obsessive chronicler of everyday lives, was collaborating at the end of his life on a Web project whose fate in print remains uncertain.

The Week Ahead: Aug. 29 — Sept. 4
A listing of cultural events this week.

Review: Venice Festival Opens With Glimpses Into the Pitfalls of Passion
Darren Aronofsky’s in-competition movie “Black Swan” and Tran Anh Hung’s “Norwegian Wood” tell of the agonies of professional dancing and of triangles within triangles.

Crescendo, in Double Time
Russians entered the French festival scene this summer with an open throttle and an open checkbook.

Venice Gears Up for 67th Film Festival
The film festival opens Wednesday and continues through Sept. 11 and will present dozens of features from 34 countries.

Beijing Opera, a Historical Treasure in Fragile Condition
Fans of the Beijing Opera Academy of China fear that it could fall victim to modernization as the economy surges, but the government is helping support the art form.

Design: An Italian Designer’s Homage to His Native Country
In a dazzlingly ambitious exhibition at La Triennale Design Museum in Milan, Alessandro Mendini has assembled a collection of objects to illustrate Italy.

Art Theft Underworld Frustrates France
The vulnerability of museums and high-end art owners to costly thefts has been a concern in France for years, but two events are forcing the issue into the open.