Clinton, Jay-Z attend 'Spider-Man' opening

NEW YORK, June 15 (UPI) -- Bill Clinton, Matt Damon, Jay-Z and Robert De Niro attended the Broadway opening of the much talked about musical "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark."

Also in the audience at Tuesday night's performance were Barbara Walters, Lesley Stahl, Helena Christensen, Steve Martin, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, Liam Neeson, Spike Lee, Julian Lennon and Diane von Furstenberg.

Barry Diller, Lou Reed, Cindy Crawford, Andrew Lloyd Webber, The Strokes, John McEnroe, Hannah Storm, Salman Rushdie, Fran Lebowitz, Gayle King, and Harry Belafonte turned out as well and were part of the crowd which gave the show's stars an ovation that lasted nearly 11 minutes, the musical's representatives said.

During the performance's curtain call, the show's musical composing team of Bono and The Edge earned "a thunderous audience reaction, followed by the entire backstage crew, along with producers Michael Cohl and Jere Harris, taking a bow, before original director Julie Taymor was dramatically brought onto the stage by co-director Philip William McKinley," a release said.

"Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" began preview performances Nov. 28, 2010. The $70 million musical closed for three weeks so its creative team could work out technical bugs and story issues. During this time, McKinley replaced Taymor as director. The show resumed preview performances last month and opened officially Tuesday night.