Broderick: master of the stage and screen

The stage production of 'The Producers' won 12 Tony awards.
By BETSY PICKLE
Scripps Howard News Service
Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane, currently starring in the film version of "The Producers" and the Broadway revival of "The Odd Couple," only appear to be joined at the hip.
"We've worked for a long time together now," says Broderick. "Not as long as it is in people's minds. We've done two plays. People think it's been a whole career in vaudeville or something."
All told, Broderick and Lane spent about 20 months rehearsing and performing together on stage in the 2001 Tony Award winner "The Producers" and several more months making the film version of the musical, which expanded its run Christmas Day. Both also provided voices for 1994's "The Lion King" -- Broderick was the lion Simba, and Lane was the meerkat Timon.
"I love working with him. I hope to keep doing it," says Broderick, whose other famous union is with actress wife Sarah Jessica Parker, with whom he "produced" 3-year-old son James Wilke.
Striking a chord
On stage, "The Producers" was a smash, setting box-office records and winning 12 Tonys, including Best Musical, Book of a Musical, Original Score, Actor-Musical (Lane), Featured Actor (Gary Beach) and Featured Actress (Cady Huffman). Susan Stroman, who won Tonys for directing and choreographing "The Producers," makes her feature-directing debut with the film.
Broderick doesn't know why "The Producers," the story of a hack Broadway producer and an accountant trying to get rich by staging a flop, hit such a chord.
"From the minute we started doing it, the audience was, like, 'Yeah. More! That's what we want,"' he says. "The second we started in Chicago, audiences loved it. Even jokes that weren't very good, they were like, 'Fine. It doesn't matter.'
"I don't know why it's so popular. Some people said it's the silliness of it and that it was politically incorrect. At that time it was a joy for people to see a musical that was just entertaining. It wasn't 'Les Miz.' It wasn't operatic. It was an old-fashioned musical comedy."