Once Broadway was the grooming ground for Hollywood; a stepping stone to the riches of the movie mecca on the west coast. These days the 2,500-mile trek between America's east and west coasts continues to be made by the biggest names in cinema - but now in the opposite direction.
America's A-list is deserting Hollywood to tread the famous old boards of Broadway. New York's theatre critics have identified a new artistic consensus among Hollywood's leading players, keen to prove they can withstand the intellectual rigour and live demands of Broadway.
The vibrant avenue that bisects Manhattan has never been so star-studded. Of the 24 shows running last week, almost 40 per cent starred household Hollywood names. Fourteen A-list actors appeared, among them Jeff Goldblum (The Pillowman), Brooke Shields (Chicago) and John Lithgow (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
The biggest of all has still to arrive. Julia Roberts, a box-office force for almost two decades, is scheduled for Broadway this season in Richard Greenberg's Three Days of Rain. It has helped to generate unparalleled expectation ahead of Broadway's new season, which starts today.
Tickets for a Broadway show have never been harder to acquire. Figures from the League of American Theatres and Producers show a 10 per cent increase in box-office takings to $376.4 million (£208m) over the past 22 weeks compared with last year, with an extra 400,000 customers during the same period, a total of 5.6 million.
Last week alone, the 22 Broadway shows took almost $11m from nearly 160,000 people. Most put the revival down to the simple mantra: stars sell. Theatre owners have also made a big play over customers being able to identify with stars. Most famous names are regularly seen signing programmes with fans outside the stage doors.
The league's president, Jed Bernstein, said there was a new keenness among Hollywood's elite: 'Live performance has always been the ultimate torture test for movie folk, where they can measure their ability to perform on a consistent basis. They can't run and hide in their trailers.'
They are certainly not in it for the money. Roberts is reputed to earn around $24,000 for her theatre run, while she can command up to $20m for a movie.
Yet for all the glamour of Hollywood, among the most anticipated plays for the coming season is the British import of Alan Bennett's The History Boys, which, following a successful run in London, will open next year on Broadway - without a star in sight.
