Blackout Dims Show-Biz Scene

Contrary to the old saying, the lights went out on Broadway yesterday. And a big swath of the Northeast.

The mammoth--and so far unexplained--power failure across the eastern U.S and parts of Canada forced the cancellation of all 19 musicals and three plays in New York's theater district. The blackout also shuttered movie theaters, disrupted the work of film and media companies, forced radio stations to broadcast over phone lines, some newspapers to put out limited Friday editions and even pulled the plug on Iggy Pop and the Stooges reunion homecoming in Detroit.

While the outage left several million people in the dark, some show-biz types were able to soldier on thanks to backup generators. For example, production was only briefly interrupted on such New York-area TV and movie productions as HBO's The Sopranos and the Nicole Kidman remake of The Stepford Wives and the Toronto-based Olsen twins romanic comedy New York Minute as their alternate power supplies kicked in.

National news programs kept running, several showcasing their stars against the non-sparkling Manhattan skyline: NBC managed to juice up enough power (after all they are owned by General Electric) to keep Brian Williams in studio, where he opened the NBC Nightly News cast with, "Thanks to emergency generators and a whole lot of scrambling here that we are able to say this Thursday night, good evening from NBC News headquarters in midtown Manhattan, where we are in the midst of what appears to be a colossal and history-making blackout." He was sitting in for Tom Brokaw, who was on vacation. At ABC, Peter Jennings was also off duty, so, to make for what a network spokesperson called as "more secure" operation, the nightly news was beamed out of Washington, D.C., with Ted Koppel anchoring. CBS' Dan Rather was at his post in Manhattan, and Fox News Channel continued to run out of New York. CNN, beamed from Atlanta, and New Jersey-based MSNBC, did not have their signals interrupted While the power companies continue to pass around the blame from Canada to Ohio and back again, businesses struggle back to normal. Our reporter in New York, forced to use a pay phone, reports nearly all Broadway shows plan to open Friday, although some with have to made do with fewer set changes because of low wattage. Tourists have already been queuing at the TKTS booth in Times Square as the neon lights and Jumbotron have come back on.

Movie theaters also plan to butter their popcorn and open Friday, but how many New Yorkers, weary from hours stuck in elevators and subway trains, from trudging home, wandering in or sleeping on the streets, will seek entertainment this weekend is not known.

The lack of ticket sales on Thursday night--when large movie chains like AMC went dark in New York, Cleveland, Detroit and Toronto--will have an impact on box-office grosses, but not as bad as if the power outage had occurred on a Friday or Saturday.

"The economic impact won't be severe for a Thursday," AMC's Rick King tells Daily Variety. "And the good thing is that it looks like we'll be able to get open [Friday] for the new pictures." (Wide releases opening this weekend include such teen-skewing fare as Freddy vs. Jason and Uptown Girls.)

"We're resigned to the fact that this is a natural disaster," Universal Pictures distribution chief Nikki Rocco says in Variety. The studio currently has American Wedding and Seabiscuit in wide release. "We're going to lose a big chunk of business," Rocco adds.

Here are some others who got socked:

"I'm so bummed," Eric Danville tells the Detroit Free Press after traveling from New York. "It had to be an act of God or a solar flare that would keep me from seeing the Stooges."