The Week in Review

Retooling Spider-Man: The new creative team has gone to work on the endlessly previewing Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, making significant changes to the troubled show. According to reports in The New York Times, Playbill Online, and elsewhere, the role of Arachne, the malevolent spider goddess, is being drastically reduced, and the quartet of characters known as the Geek Chorus -- adolescent comic-book fans based on the show's original writers, Julie Taymor, Glen Berger, Bono, and The Edge -- is being eliminated altogether. In other developments, T. V. Carpio, who took over the role of Arachne from the injured Natalie Mendoza, has experienced an unspecified injury and will be out of the show for a couple of weeks. In the oddest development of the week, Daniel Ezralow, the show's original choreographer, sent out a press release announcing that, to his knowledge, he had not been fired from the production. A few hours later, it was revealed that he was, in fact, being replaced by Chase Brock. Previews continue until April, when the show shuts down for three weeks in order to implement the new script and staging.

Bret Michaels vs. The Tony Awards: The rock musician Bret Michaels has filed a lawsuit against Tony Award Productions and CBS, claiming damages for injuries sustained at the 2009 Tony Awards. At the ceremony, Michaels, who was participating in a salute to the show Rock of Ages, was hit in the head by a flying piece of scenery. At the time, he appeared unhurt, but, six months later, he suffered a subarachnoid hemorrhage, a potentially life-threatening situation, the suit alleges. According to Variety, 'The suit also alleges that CBS exploited footage of the collision to drum up publicity for the award show when the network could have just as easily employed the seven-second broadcast delay " No word yet from the defendants.

Trouble in Tennessee?: If your company is offered the opportunity to work on the theme park Festival Tennessee, you might want to think twice. According to a detailed story in Sunday's New York Times, the proposed $750-million development on a 1,500-acre site is meant to feature a pair of hotels, dozens of restaurants, a stadium, and a large water park, among other attractions. However, investigations have revealed that Dennis W. Peterson, the developer, has been dogged my misfortune. His company, the Big International Group of Entertainment, had its license revoked in Nevada; the company's president had declared personal bankruptcy; and the woman listed as the treasurer told reporters that she had never worked for the company. Peterson has also been named in a number of other lawsuits. The plans for the park were drawn up by ITEC; the company refused to comment to the Times. You can read all about it at http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/27/us/27tennessee.html?_r=2&hpw.