Before the Tonys, Broadway accelerates with ‘Once,’ ‘Newsies,’ ‘Jesus Christ’

(Deen van Meer/ Courtesy of Disney on Broadway ) - Aaron J. Albano, left, and Jess LeProtto dance in “Newsies.”

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By Peter Marks, E-mail the writers

New York — It’s that gusty time of year again, when the skies open up over Broadway and out of the clouds come the April showers of new productions, all making landfall just under the Tony Awards deadline.

The month of April is by far the busiest of the year for Broadway openings: A total of 13 plays and musicals will open, or nearly one new show every other day — representing a third of the 2012-13 season’s new productions. (The deluge starts with a revival of Gore Vidal’s “The Best Man,” officially opening Sunday, and concludes April 26 with the new musical “Leap of Faith.”)

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The Disney musical "Newsies" opens on Broadway at the Nederlander Theatre and will run at least through Aug. 19. The cast features Jeremy Jordan as Jack Kelly, John Dossett as Joseph Pulitzer and Kara Lindsay as Katherine Plumber. "Newsies" is inspired by the Newsboy Strike of 1899.

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The schedule defies most measures of logic and logistics, especially when one considers the perilous odds against Broadway success and the limited marketing tools new shows can wield in the effort to capture quickly ticket buyers’ attention. And still, in the Darwinian struggle to earn the legitimacy-conferring Tony nods that will be announced May 1, producers, as has become customary, pack the April calendar, clearly knowing that not everyone can survive.

The thunder has already begun to rumble, with the openings of three major musical productions, each seeking to get a jump on the coming Tony sweepstakes. (The trophies will be doled out at Manhattan’s Beacon Theatre on June 10.) Each of the three — “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Newsies” and “Once” — is a viable contender for end-of-the-season recognition. Even if each relies on an entirely different, time-honored Broadway entertainment value: Be it blood (“Superstar”), sweat (“Newsies”) or tears (“Once”).

The most original and emotionally exhilarating of the trio is the new stage version of “Once,” the offbeat 2007 movie musical about the unlikely Dublin romance of a depressed Irish street singer and a buoyantly unsinkable Czech immigrant. With the enchanting songs by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova left intact — and a new book by Irish playwright Enda Walsh — “Once” successfully transfers its affectionate brand of edginess to the stage. And in the team of John Tiffany and Steven Hoggett, the director and choreographer behind the muscularly inventive “Black Watch,” the musical has found matching sensibilities for the story’s off-centered tartness.

A knock among the theater cognoscenti on “Once” — which had a run at off-Broadway’s New York Theater Workshop, birthplace of “Rent” — is that the story and characters aren’t writ large enough for Broadway; like the film, it belongs more naturally to the art house. I can’t vouch for its commercial potential, but if “Once” is for more rarefied air, it’s the sort of revivifying breeze nowhere more necessary than on Broadway.

The stage of the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre is transformed by crackerjack scenery imagineer Bob Crowley into a Dublin pub. Each of the 13 cast members, with the exception of a child actress, plays both a character and an instrument. While the device has proved effective and affected in the much-talked about revivals of Stephen Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd” and “Company” by director John Doyle, the approach feels seamless here. Music is the conveyance of love, as the singer known only as Guy (Steve Kazee) is schooled in tuneful confidence-building by the iron-willed Girl (Cristin Milioti), who falls in love with him and the sounds he makes on his guitar.