First 'Tommy' night canceled

BY JACKIE DEMALINE

The Cincinnati Enquirer

See me, feel me, touch me, heal me — but not until Wednesday, March 9. Tommy, the Broadway smash that has sold out its Broadway Series run at the Taft Theatre, will cancel its March 8 opening because of a 30-plus hour load-in time. The show also canceled its first scheduled performances earlier this season in Louisville and Columbus.

Tuesday’s performance has been rescheduled at 1 p.m. Thursday, March 10. The Broadway series is offering refunds, gift certificates and exchanges if possible — but in a sell-out run, exchanges are unlikely. “God knows if there were anything we could do about it, we would,” Broadway Series spokesman Dik Hatchell said.

Tommy, a staging of Pete Townshend’s rock opera for The Who, is the most technically complex show on Broadway and national tour in its kaleidoscopic telling of the “deaf, dumb and blind kid” whose pinball wizardry transforms him into a pop icon. The show is trucked between cities on Mondays. Travel time plus 31 hours of set-up time “does not a Tuesday opening make,” Hatchell sighed.

Tommy producers will offer an “edible apology” to ticket holders who opt for the Thursday performance by way of a pre-performance “free lunch” served at the Taft Theatre. Information: 241-2345.