Critic's corner

0 Comments | USA TODAY, October, 2004 | by Robert Bianco

* Broadway: The American Musical (PBS, 9 ET/PT, times may vary) travels from West Side Story to Wicked tonight in an entertaining concluding segment that moves from 1957 to the present. These were tumultuous decades for the musical theater, as the rise of rock pushed Broadway music off the charts and Broadway artists in new directions.

Tonight's two hours takes us from Fiddler on the Roof ("the sunset of the old-style Broadway musical") to the diamond-bright brilliance of Stephen Sondheim to the invasion of the British super-musicals to current crowd-pleasers such as The Producers and Hairspray. The economics have changed: Broadway is now a bigger, more tourist-driven business than it once was. But as you'll see when Broadway goes backstage at last season's big hit Wicked ,...