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Broadway stars campaign to get out the vote

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Broadway stars campaign to get out the vote

A still from Broadway Votes’ “Carrying the Message” video. The video is part of a campaign that engages New York theater talent to encourage audiences to head to the polls.

Jenny Anderson/Broadway Votes


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Jenny Anderson/Broadway Votes

A new video encouraging Broadway fans to vote has being popping up on social media feeds lately.

Set at a workers’ rally at the turn of the last century, the musical number called “Carrying the Message” plays off the 1990s musical Newsies, about a group of disenfranchised newsboys.

The original creators of Newsies, including composer Alan Menken and director Kenny Ortega, are behind this new take for the 2024 election. It also features a slew of Broadway talent such as Nikki M James, who starred in the Tony Award-winning political musical Suffs.

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This music video is one of a number of ways — both online and on stage — in which the new nonprofit Broadway Votes has been working to inspire Broadway audiences to head to the voting booth.

“Because Broadway in particular is a commercial industry, very little partisan work gets done, it felt like this incredible opportunity to leverage the talents of people who work in the industry and encourage people across the country to get out and vote,” said Catherine Markowitz, theater producer and co-founder and director of Broadway Votes.

Broadway Votes has also been mobilizing New York’s stages and stars to engage audiences lately through curtain-call announcements about the importance of voting at shows like Once Upon A Mattress, Hadestown and Little Shop of Horrors.

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The nonprofit also organized a get-out-the-vote concert in New York’s Times Square, a music video featuring Tony Award winning performer Alex Newell and the Broadway Inspirational Voices singing group in a performance of a new arrangement of “Keep Marching” from Suffs, and various online giveaways and contests, including a costume contest judged by Broadway celebrities Betsy Wolfe, J Harrison Ghee and Rachel Bloom. The winner will be announced on election day.

Data shared via email with NPR from the arts-focused voter registration nonprofit Headcount shows these efforts have so far led to thousands of voter registrations.

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Broadway Votes has also inspired some formerly reticent theater insiders to become politically engaged.

“I’ve always found myself in between two worlds,” said performer Tommy Bracco, who said he divides his time between his mostly red-leaning family on Staten Island and blue-leaning entertainment industry colleagues in Manhattan. “And because so many people close to me are so passionate about this, I have kind of felt afraid to use my voice [for political causes].” 

Now he’s playing one of the leads in the “Carrying the Message” music video.

“Broadway Votes encouraged me to use my voice for the first time ever,” Bracco said. “In a world where everything is so divided, Broadway Votes is bringing people together.”

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Ruby slippers worn in 'The Wizard of Oz' are auctioned for a record $28 million

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Ruby slippers worn in 'The Wizard of Oz' are auctioned for a record  million

Sequin-covered ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz appear at the offices of Profiles in History in Calabasas, Calif. on Nov. 9, 2001.

Reed Saxon/AP


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MINNEAPOLIS — A pair of iconic ruby slippers that were worn by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz and stolen from a museum nearly two decades ago sold for a winning bid of $28 million at auction Saturday.

Heritage Auctions had estimated that they would fetch $3 million or more, but the fast-paced bidding far outpaced that amount within seconds and tripled it within minutes. A few bidders making offers by phone volleyed back and forth for 15 minutes as the price climbed to the final, eye-popping sum.

Including the Dallas-based auction house’s fee, the unknown buyer will ultimately pay $32.5 million.

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Online bidding, which opened last month, had stood at $1.55 million before live bidding began late Saturday afternoon.

The sparkly red heels were on display at the Judy Garland Museum in her hometown of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, in 2005 when Terry Jon Martin used a hammer to smash the glass of the museum’s door and display case.

Their whereabouts remained a mystery until the FBI recovered them in 2018. Martin, now 77, who lives near Grand Rapids in northern Minnesota, wasn’t publicly exposed as the thief until he was indicted in May 2023. He pleaded guilty in October 2023. He was in a wheelchair and on supplementary oxygen when he was sentenced last January to time served because of his poor health.

His attorney, Dane DeKrey, explained ahead of sentencing that Martin, who had a long history of burglary and receiving stolen property, was attempting to pull off “one last score” after an old associate with connections to the mob told him the shoes had to be adorned with real jewels to justify their $1 million insured value. But a fence — a person who buys stolen goods — later told him the rubies were just glass, DeKrey said. So Martin got rid of the slippers. The attorney didn’t specify how.

The alleged fence, Jerry Hal Saliterman, 77, of the Minneapolis suburb of Crystal, was indicted in March. He was also in a wheelchair and on oxygen when he made his first court appearance. He’s scheduled to go on trial in January and hasn’t entered a plea, though his attorney has said he’s not guilty.

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The shoes were returned in February to memorabilia collector Michael Shaw, who had loaned them to the museum. They were one of several pairs that Garland wore during the filming, but only four pairs are known to have survived. In the movie, to return from Oz to Kansas, Dorothy had to click her heels three times and repeat, “There’s no place like home.”

As Rhys Thomas, author of The Ruby Slippers of Oz, put it, the sequined shoes from the beloved 1939 musical have seen “more twists and turns than the Yellow Brick Road.”

Over 800 people had been tracking the slippers, and the company’s webpage for the auction had hit nearly 43,000 page views by Thursday, said Robert Wilonsky, a vice president with the auction house.

Among those bidding to bring the slippers home was the Judy Garland Museum, which posted on Facebook shortly after that it did not place the winning bid. The museum had campaigned for donations to supplement money raised by the city of Grand Rapids at its annual Judy Garland festival and the $100,000 set aside this year by Minnesota lawmakers to help the museum purchase the slippers.

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After the slippers sold, the auctioneer told bidders and spectators in the room and watching online that the previous record for a piece of entertainment memorabilia was $5.52 million, for the white dress Marilyn Monroe famously wore atop a windy subway grate.

The auction also included other memorabilia from The Wizard of Oz, such as a hat worn by Margaret Hamilton, who played the original Wicked Witch of the West. That item went for $2.4 million, or a total final cost to the buyer of $2.93 million.

The Wizard of Oz story has gained new attention in recent weeks with the release of the movie Wicked, an adaptation of the megahit Broadway musical, a prequel of sorts that reimagines the character of the Wicked Witch of the West.

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Bill Romanowski Says He's Feeling Great Despite '20 Documented Concussions'

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Bill Romanowski Says He's Feeling Great Despite '20 Documented Concussions'

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Where tradwives and leftists agree : Code Switch

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Where tradwives and leftists agree : Code Switch
Illustration in four panels of woman working, woman cooking, woman cleaning and woman serving husband

The rise of momfluencers and tradwives are filling a void for modern mothers. In this episode, we continue our conversation about the hellscape of modern motherhood, and look into an alternative to the tradwife lifestyle.

We want to hear from our listeners about what you like about Code Switch and how we could do better. Please tell us what you think by taking our short survey, and thank you!

This episode was produced by Jess Kung. It was edited by Courtney Stein. Our engineer was Josephine Nyounai.

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