Broadway Games: The Shows of Sherie Rene Scott

Who knew that being a stand-by could make you the talk of the season? Well, that's exactly what has happened to Sherie Rene Scott, Kristin Chenoweth's stand-by in the ill-fated The Queen of Versailles. For some, she's a new face, but for those of us who've been around the theater scene for awhile, we know she's been taking Broadway by storm for decades.

Broadway Games:

The Shows of Sherie Rene Scott

DIRECTIONS: For each production photo below, name the show and the role Sherie Rene played in it. Good luck!

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From Where We Sat: The St. James Theatre

Today, we have the next in our series of seating articles based on many of your emails requests and questions, namely "how were your seats?" Sure, I'm aware of another website that provides a similar service that covers New York theaters, national theaters and concert and sporting venues. I hope to provide a bit more information and insight. That said, if there's anything more you'd like to know or want to share your own experiences please feel free to contact us on social media at JKsTheatreScene.

From Where We Sat:

The St. James Theatre

The Theatre: 

• 246 W. 44th Street
• Current capacity: 1709 seats
• Orchestra, Mezzanine and Balcony seating

What We Saw There:

• The Queen of Versailles (review HERE)

Where We Sat: 

• Mezzanine Center Row H, Seats 101 & 102. The seating in this theater has average leg room. The seats themselves were comfortable and in excellent condition.

What We Paid: 

• $79.00 (Mailer discount price) The same seats on a Wednesday matinee are currently $119.00 each at the box office. We saved $40.00 a ticket and paid no fees!

The Location: 

• Upon entering the theater, we were directed straight ahead and up the stairs. The staircase is pretty big and steep, but not unmanageable. (There is no elevator to the upper levels.) At the landing, our seats were straight ahead. At that point in the mezzanine, row H begins in the center only.
• Row H is the eighth row from the front railing of the mezzanine.

Seat Amenities and Exiting the Theatre:

• These seats are comfortable and well maintained.
• The rows of the mezzanine are essentially stadium seating. From here you are looking at everything straight on and down. 
• Exiting the theatre is particularly easy and simple from here. The wide aisle begins there. Then it is straight ahead, around a corner and down the steps. With several exit doors from the box office lobby, and the side lobby, getting out is pretty painless. I will say it isn't as easy from the orchestra seats.  
• We were out of the theater and on our way in less than 5 minutes post curtain call.

So how was the view*?

• We had a full view of the action, including the front of the stage and upstage.
• The seats were pretty close to dead center, and with the rake of the seats, we were pretty much seeing it straight on, with the actors in view from head to toe at all times. I don't think people in the orchestra seating on the extreme sides or too close to the tall stage can say the same.
• The seats are also close enough that facial expressions and set and costume details were crystal clear.

The bottom line:

• I would choose these seats specifically. The view is perfect, and they are comfortable.

* - Your seating preferences may vary, of course. And these seats may not be as ideal for a different production.

Other seating at The St. James Theatre

• We have seen several productions at this theater and we've sat in various locations in the orchestra, mezzanine and balcony areas. 
• A couple of times, we sat in the left side and center orchestra sections. The seats had an average amount of leg room. You could see the whole stage at once, but it isn't too far from the stage, so you can still see the details and facial expressions. The legroom is less generous in the orchestra, but it isn't uncomfortable. The seats there have a typical rake, so seeing over others can be difficult if someone tall sits in front of you. Do with that information what you will.
• The view from the balcony is full, but the angle is steep and the stage feels pretty far away. The leg room is not great. If stairs are an issue for you, I do not recommend sitting up there. That said, the price difference in these seats may make sitting there a great economic choice, if that's an issue for you. (This production did not offer balcony seating.)

Holiday Gifts For Theater Fans!

Happy holidays friends, readers and theater lovers! No matter how you celebrate, we wish you and yours the very best of the season and the new year! 

Are you still on the hunt for the perfect gift for the theater kids and Broadway fans in your life? Maybe you are looking for something for yourself? In any case we have tons of memorabilia and collectible items for pretty much any budget!

From Playbills to window cards, from rare collectibles to Lights of Broadway cards, we have items that cover the last 30 years right up to shows from this season.

JK's TheatreScene

Holiday Gifts For Theater Fans!

As you may or may not know, we have a shop set up on eBay, loaded with hundreds of items**. All of the selections below and so many others can be found HERE.

Broadway Marquee Note Cards

Are you getting ready to host a holiday party and need some cards for invitations? Or maybe you have a show fan in your life that would love a set of blank note cards? We have dozens of titles - hits, flops, classics - that show off Broadway's brightest marquees!  Check out the full inventory HERE. Or create a whole set of 10 HERE.

Broadway Show Flyers -

Today's Hits & Yesterday's Classics

Perfect stocking stuffers for fans of certain shows and/or stars! These advertising flyers make perfect additions to Broadway scrapbooks or collections of advertising memorabilia. Dozens of titles to choose from. Contemporary items HERE. Vintage titles HERE.

 

Unique Collectible Packages

It's Broadway's Best Musical. Ever. Truly One Singular Sensation! We've assembled a one of a kind package of memorabilia from the 2006 revival of A Chorus Line. It includes a Playbill, a flyer, a note card, a note pad and an Opening Night nylon backpack. Details HERE.

Andrew Lloyd Webber fans, how about a really unique gift? A set of five collectible $5 chips from the Las Vegas Hilton engagement of Starlight Express! Details HERE.

Broadway and National Tour

Souvenir Programs

Dozens of titles! Several different programs from The Phantom of the Opera, mega musicals like the original Chess, and other gems like Jerome Robbins' Broadway, Memhis, and such tours as Miss Saigon, Hello, Dolly! (Carol Channing), Grease!, Crazy for You, Into the Woods.

Playbills

Current, Vintage...

Broadway, Off-Broadway, National Tours...

We have hundreds of Playbills, hundreds of titles from the 90's to today! Special editions, opening night, highly collectible! Fill in your collection or catch up on today's hits and misses!

Here are just a few:

• Now Playing: Buena Vista Social Club, Operation Mincemeat, The Queen of Versailles (Sherie Rene Scott!), Ragtime, Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York), Death Becomes Her, Hadestown
• Recent Favorites: Gypsy (Audra McDonald), Once Upon a One More Time, Bat Boy, Dead Outlaw, Floyd Collins, Illinoise, Real Women Have Curves
• Original Cast Vintage: Spring Awakening, In the Heights, Tarzan, The Little Mermaid, The Drowsy Chaperone, Xanadu
• Beloved Flops: Cry-Baby, A Catered Affair, Passing Strange, The Story of My Life
• ...and so many more!

Lights of Broadway Cards

Add to your collection or start a new one! We have hundreds to choose from from the Megamix set to all of the years from Autumn 2017 right up to the 2025 set!

Window Cards

We have dozens of titles to choose from - big hits, big misses, some off-Broadway, some National Tour! Look though our inventory to see them all. Don't see something you are looking for? We have more in our inventory than we have listed - we haven't had time to post them all. Just ask and we'll see if we have it!

We also have some books, scripts and other odds and ends. Are you a Disney fan? We have some of that, too!

**When you see something you like, be sure to read the Item Description section of the item to see the exact current inventory. That is updated in real time, the photos are not,

REVIEW: The Queen of Versailles

Review of the Wednesday, December 3, 2025 matinee performance at the St. James Theatre in New York City. Starring Sherie Rene Scott, F. Murray Abraham, Melody Butiu, Stephen DeRosa, Greg Hildreth, Tatum Grace Hopkins, Isabel Keating and Nina White. Music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz. Book by Lindsey Ferrentino. Based on Lauren Greenfield's documentary film, The Queen of Versailles, and the life stories of Jackie and David Siegel. Orchestrations by John Clancy. Music supervision by Mary-Mitchell Campbell. Scenic and video design by Dane Laffery. Costume design by Christian Cowan. Lighting design by Natasha Katz. Sound design by Peter Hylenski. Choreography by Lauren Yalango-Grant and Christopher Cree Grant. Direction by Michael Arden. 2 hours 30 minutes, including one intermission.

I've heard it said that no show is as great as its best review, nor is it as bad as its worst review. That is certainly the case with the hot mess that is The Queen of Versailles. It is a pretty lavish production, that is, shall we say, efficiently staged. There are some actually funny lines, and there are a couple of decent songs. It also suffers from an identity crisis. Is this a send up? Is this a sincere effort at a bio-musical? Is it a French history lesson? A scathing commentary on billionaire Americans? Who knows? Who cares?

Based on the documentary film of the same title, the show tells the story of the rise and fall of Jackie Siegel, who did a lot - put herself through college (Red Lobster waitress, corpse cleaner, etc.) and earns an engineering degree. Desperation, an abusive first husband, and a baby led her to, among other things, a Mrs. Florida pageant, for which she won $1,500. Some other stuff happens, then along comes David, an older man with money to burn who wants to take her in and fulfill her every champagne wish and caviar dream. She becomes addicted to the more and more and still more lifestyle, and inexplicably loses her backbone and her intelligence. 

Lindsey Ferrentino's book covers quite a bit of territory and manages to wring out every drop of blood out of the heavy-handed French Revolution metaphor, including a grizzly depiction of the moments leading to the beheading of the aristocracy. Not only is it unnecessary (it adds zero to the story), but it is also inappropriately laughable. I half expected the poor ensemble to begin vogue-ing a la the MTV awards performance by Madonna. It was that campy. Plot holes? Sure! Where are all of the rest of her kids? Why does she become such an airhead? Why are her parents relentlessly cheery and unwilling to stop their daughter from making such stupid choices?

Stephen Schwartz maybe should have stuck to his vow to stop writing for Broadway. Is he embarrassed by what he's done here? He should be. There are a couple of decent songs -don't ask me which ones, I don't remember - but I do remember that they are sung by secondary characters. Mostly though, the songs don't stick with you, but rather leave impressions. Several times, I literally cringed at the verbal acrobatics necessary to get lines to rhyme. Why, Stephen, why? There is one number I don't think I'll ever erase from my memory, try as I will, and that is the insane "The Ballad of the Timeshare King" number with F. Murray Abraham center stage "yee haw-ing" his way through the lavish scenery and video changes while surrounded by cowboy-clad dancers. Tacky and jaw-droppingly bad. How the mighty have fallen. To his credit, Abraham gives a fully committed, very game performance. You can't accuse him of phoning it in!

 

The rest of the cast seems equally committed to giving their all, though at times I felt like they were slightly embarrassed. Both Stephen DeRosa and Isabel Keating do what they can with the one-note roles they are given. And I actually felt sorry for Greg Hildreth who is saddled with an almost non-existent character who tells us everything we need to know about him like he's reciting a Wikipedia page. He even gets to say (inevitably) "Let them eat cake!" before he makes his exit. All three deserve better. It is a crime that that much talent was wasted. The same could be said for Melody Bitiu who manages to actually make us care about her long-suffering nanny character, and it was fun that she got to talk about Imelda Marcos' shoes after having co-starred in Here Lies Love a couple of seasons ago.

The two most interesting characters (I might have enjoyed a whole musical about them) are Jackie's daughter Victoria and her niece Jonquil. Played by Nina White and Tatum Grace Hopkins respectively, both have interesting arcs, providing the only two voices of reason in a sea of chaos. They even manage to survive the most cringey ballad in recent Broadway history when they bury a neglected pet lizard. Will their careers survive?

What dancing there is - that cowboy thing and a rummage sale production number are all that stick out to me - is serviceable at best. That it took two people to create it (Lauren Yalango-Grant and Christopher Cree Grant) is as shocking as the amateur quality of it. That Michael Arden was able to keep it all moving so efficiently should be studied. The number of moving pieces here are astonishing. But efficiency does not an interesting - let alone moving or even meaningful - musical make. It is hard to believe this is work by the same person responsible for the wonder that was the beauty of Spring Awakening or the utter charm of Maybe Happy Ending. 

Technically, the show is aces - you certainly get your money's worth. Christian Cowan's reported 1,100 costumes are a sight to behold, and Natasha Katz' lighting is elegant and vibrant. Dane Laffery pulled double duty as video designer and scenic designer. They are lavish and plentiful and have a few nice surprises.

The entire reason we even got tickets, though, was to see Sherie Rene Scott. She did not disappoint. Equal parts sincerity and playful parody, she truly made a meal out of a morsel. She had us in the palm of her hand from her first entrance right through to the curtain call. You could feel the empathy in the audience when she asks, "are they laughing at us or with us?" And you almost feel sorry for her at the end when she's all alone in the huge ballroom, the only part of the house that was completed. (Talk about unintentional irony!)

I can't even imagine Kristin in the role. I don't want to. I am glad we saw Sherie.

Sadly, the whole thing left me as empty and cold as that ballroom.

📸: J. Cervantes, M. Murphy

Broadway Quiz: The 24 Best Musicals of the First 25 Years of the 21st Century

As 2025 draws to a close, so does the first quarter of the 21st century. There have been 24 Tony Award-winning Best Musicals (thank you, pandemic) in that time, and that's what today's quiz is all about! Good luck!

Broadway Quiz:

The 24 Best Musicals of the First

25 Years of the 21st Century

 

The Producers (2001)     Hairspray (2003)

DIRECTIONS: Considering only the titles below, answer each question. Some of the questions will have multiple answers, and some titles will be used more than once.

 

Spring Awakening (2007)     Kinky Boots (2013)

The Producers        Thoroughly Modern Millie        Hairspray        Avenue Q

Spamalot        Jersey Boys        Spring Awakening        In the Heights

Billy Elliot        Memphis         The Book of Mormon        Once        Kinky Boots

A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder        Fun Home        Hamilton

Dear Evan Hansen        The Band's Visit        Hadestown        Moulin Rouge!

A Strange Loop     Kimberly Akimbo     The Outsiders     Maybe Happy Ending

 

A Gentleman's Guide... (2014)     The Band's Visit (2018)

1. Which Best Musicals were based on a book or play?

2. Which Best Musicals were based on a film?

3. Which Best Musicals were based on a completely original idea?

4. How many Best Musicals won 10 or more Tony Awards?

5. How many Best Musicals started off-Broadway?

 

A Strange Loop (2022)     The Outsiders (2024)

6. How many Best Musicals played in London before arriving on Broadway?

7. How many Best Musicals take place outside of the United States?

8. Which Best Musicals have scores that represent the Broadway debut of their writers?

9. How many of these Best Musicals have had Broadway Revivals?

10. Which of these Best Musicals have been made into movies that have been released nationally in movie theaters?