Earlier in the week, the film of the Kander and Ebb musical received three Golden Globe Awards, including one for Best Musical or Comedy. On Jan. 21, the Directors Guild of America announced its nominees for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film for 2002. The five nominees include Marshall for "Chicago," Stephen Daldry for "The Hours," Peter Jackson for "Lord of the Rings: Two Towers," Roman Polanski for "The Pianist" and Martin Scorsese for "Gangs of New York."
The winner of the award will be announced at the 55th Annual DGA Awards Dinner, which will be held March 1 at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. The DGA Award is an amazingly accurate barometer of who will win the Academy Award for Best Director. Only five times since the DGA Award's inception — in 1949 — have the two awards not coincided.
"Chicago" — which opens wide Feb. 7 — also nabbed three awards, including Best Picture, at the Broadcast Film Critics Association's eighth annual Critics' Choice Awards. The ceremony, held Jan. 17 at the Beverly Hills Hotel, also awarded prizes to Catherine Zeta-Jones for Best Supporting Actress and to the entire company of "Chicago" for Best Acting Ensemble. Representing 187, TV, radio and on-line critics, the BCFA is the largest critics organization in North America.
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Featuring a star-studded cast led by Renée Zellweger (Roxie Hart), Catherine Zeta-Jones (Velma Kelly) and Richard Gere (Billy Flynn), the "Chicago" company also includes John C. Reilly (Amos Hart), Dominic West (Fred Caseley), Christine Baranski (Mary Sunshine), Queen Latifah (Mama Morton) as well as Taye Diggs, Colm Feore, Lucy Liu, Mya, Marc Calamia, Deidre Goodwin, Sebastian La Cause, Mary Ann Lamb and a cameo from original Chicago star Chita Rivera. Marshall, the choreographer of Broadway's Kiss of the Spider Woman and the revivals of Damn Yankees, She Loves Me, Cabaret and Little Me, directed the $45 million film, his motion-picture debut. Bill Condon wrote the "Chicago" screenplay for Miramax Studios, and the film's cinematographer was Dion Beebe. The Tony-winning lighting team of Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer lit the film.
John Kander and Fred Ebb's musical, which features such songs as "All That Jazz," "Mister Cellophane," "Class" and "Nowadays," debuted on Broadway in June 1975 with choreography by the late Bob Fosse and a cast led by Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera and Jerry Orbach. The Tony winning revival opened in Nov. 1996 with Bebe Neuwirth, Ann Reinking, Joel Grey and James Naughton in the lead roles. Featuring direction by Walter Bobbie and choreography by Reinking "in the style of Bob Fosse," the musical satire continues to thrill audiences at the Shubert Theatre.
