Photo: Greg Mooney
Three cheers for “Bring it On: The Musical.” Better yet, make it 300 cheers!
“Bring It On” brings a great script, fantastic choreography and dancing, fine singing, acting and tumbling, and witty lyrics to the Alliance Theatre. This show’s energy could boil a pot of water.
A Tony Award-winning crew has put together a spectacular story, with funny lines, true-to-life characters, fantastic choreography and music that runs the gamut from hip-hop, to rock (with a nod to Bohemian Rhapsody), to mainstream Broadway-style show tunes.
Finally, at the end of her junior year in high school, Campbell fulfills her life-long dream of being named cheerleading captain. She holds cheerleading tryouts, and against the wishes of the other cheerleaders, she allows a freshman, Eva, to join the Varsity cheerleading squad. Campbell also makes Eva a third alternate to take over the title of captain, should anything happen to her.
Just a couple of weeks before her senior year at Truman high school is to begin, the school board votes on redistricting. A new district line is drawn between her house and that of her next door neighbor, Eva.
Campbell is forced to attend Jackson High, where there is no cheerleading squad and the popular kids are hip-hop dancers who work in burger shops, unlike her friends at Truman who are given cars and don’t work.
While jokes about cheerleaders and high school life are bandied about, the characters are so true-to-life. They aren’t imitations of the Goth, hippies, Barbie-doll girls and hip-hop crowds. They’re all there, but they’re tough, funny and vulnerable. They are people you’ve seen and known, not silly parodies.
These characters are fun to watch, especially Campbell, who dresses in a leprechaun outfit on a dare just to fit in with the Jackson cool crowd. The perky, pretty blonde learns how to jive with the hip-hop dance crew, which includes a black transsexual sporting a large ‘70s-style afro.
Costumes normally pass me by, but these costumes are so real and so hip, from the Goth combat black leather boots to the Velvet Underground T-shirts to the large, gold oversized earrings. The street clothes are colorful yet stand out in an understated way.
Making its world premiere at the Alliance Theatre, “Bring it On: The Musical” is the musical version of the hit cheerleading movie “Bring It On.” Although I’ve never seen the movie, I understand the musical differs in the story line.
With an original book by Tony Award-winner Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q), music and lyrics by Tony Award-winning composer Lin-Manuel Miranda (In the Heights), music by Pulitzer and Tony Award-winning composer Tom Kitt (Next to Normal) and lyrics by Broadway lyricist Amanda Green (High Fidelity), “Bring It On: The Musical” is most likely Broadway bound. The production is directed and choreographed by Tony Award-winner Andy Blankenbuehler (In the Heights).
The lead actors include Amanda Lea LaVergne (Campbell), who recently performed in “Grease” and “All Shook Up” on Broadway; Adrienne Warren (Danielle), fresh from the recent national tour of “Dreamgirls;” and Nick Blaemire (Randall), who appeared in the original Broadway production of “Cry-Baby.”
The cast includes some of the nation’s most skilled cheerleaders, whose combined achievements include more than 25 national titles and 50 team titles in gymnastics and choreography.
There are very few productions I would like to see twice. But this one? Bring it on!
“Bring It On: The Musical” runs through Feb. 20 at the Alliance Theatre.
Cast:
Antwan Bethea, Nick Blaemire, Courtney Corbelle, Ariana DeBose, Brandon Espinoza, Kelly Felthous, Shawn Alynda Fisher, Brooklyn A. Frietag, Gregory Haney, Rod Harrelson, Dominique Johnson, Stephanie C. Klemons, Janet Krupin, Amanda Lea LaVergne, Melody Mills, Michael Mindlin, Griffin Myers, Michael Naone-Carter, David Ranck, Ryann Redmond, Elena Ricardo, Kate Rockwell, Billie Sue Roe, Jon Rua, LaQuet Sharnell, Ephraim M. Sykes, Sheldon Tucker, Adrienne Warren, Lauren Whitt
The “West Side Story” National Tour opened tonight at the Fox Theatre. Revived on Broadway in 2009, the updated production was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Play.
The original production back in 1957 was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Musical and won a Tony for Best Choreography.
This production is a “tougher” version of “West Side Story,” the version playwright Arthur Laurents, now 92, says he always wanted to do, according to notes in the playbill.
It is tougher and a lot more sexual and raw, especially the Officer Krupke number.
Raw is good, but nothing beats gut wrenching passion. If there were more of that, it could catapult this production from being good to being great.
“West Side Story” runs Jan. 25-30 at the Fox Theatre.
Arthur Laurents (Book)
Leonard Bernstein (Music)
Stephen Sondheim (Lyrics)
Jerome Robbins (Choreography)
David Saint (Director)
The cast:
Ali Ewoldt
Michelle Aravena
Joseph J. Simone
German Santiago
Mike Boland
Ryan Christopher Chotto
Stephen DeRosa
Drew Foster
Alexandra Frohlinger
Jay Garcia
Nathan Keen
Christopher Patrick Mullen
John O’Creagh
Kyle Robinson
Cary Tedder
Lauren Boyd
Alicia Charles
Beth Crandall
Grant Gustin
Dean Andre de Luna
Ted Ely
Lori Ann Ferreri
Ryan Ghysels
Grant Gustin
Tim Hausmann
Déa Julien
Daniel Kermidas
Kristen Paulicelli
Christie Portera
Alexandra Blake Redelico
Erika Santillana
Kevin Santos
Michael Scirrotto
Jeffrey C. Sousa
Jessica Swesey
Kathryn Lin Terza
Kirstin Tucker
Chicago 2nd City
“The Second City Miracle on 1280 Peachtree Street” is cute and good for a few laughs. But if you’re looking for side-splitting laughter from Chicago’s famous improvisational theater company The Second City, you probably won’t find it here.
It is better than last year’s Second City Holiday show. But if you’re nostalgic and looking for “something wonderful right away,” (the title of a history book on The Second City), you’ll have to sit tight through the opening musical number. The improv scenes are better than the songs.
Some of the scripted scenes and scripted improve scenes are good and quite funny, such as the father and son scene, and the party scene.
The cast is a mélange of six performers Ric Walker, Micah Sherman, and Claudia Michelle Wallace, all of The Second City; and locals Amy Roeder of JackPie Theatre, and Tara Ochs and Randy Havens of Dad’s Garage Theare.
The play was written and created by T.J. Shanoff and Seth Weitberg with additional material by the cast of Second City.
“The Second City” plays through Dec. 12 at the Alliance Theatre’s Hertz Theatre.
Photo by Stephen Poff: Alpha Campell Jackson (Tonia Jackson) and her daughter Lillie (Karan Kendrick)
I wonder why people all around me are laughing when I’m not. Are these lines really funny?
I’m at the Alliance Theatre watching “The Nacirema Society” by renowned playwright and New York Times best-selling novelist Pearl Cleage.
Apparently, a lot of people think this show is funny. Maybe I don’t because there are two couples behind me editorializing after every couple of lines and won’t shut up.
Maybe that’s why I’m not laughing so much. I wonder if it’s because I’m not black. Except the white couple next to me is laughing as much as the black couple next to me.
Either way, I don’t find this show funny or believable.
It is 1964 in Montgomery, Alabama, and we’re watching an elite society of black families prepare for the annual cotillion. Would these Noel Coward-type snobbish elderly black women really talk in that British style, forcing their words straight from the middle part of the mouths rather than from their throats or their diaphragms like most Americans? Other than Madonna, who else in this country talks like that? In the South? And would these wealthy families speak no colloquialisms and have no Southern dialects? I don’t buy it.
I can’t imagine a family of any race or religion from Alabama that would speak in that manner. We all have roots, and these two women – Grace Dunbar and Catherine Green – seem to have been plucked from Britain in the 1930s .
“The Nacirema Society” revolves around a couple of charades: a false claim of love, a false claim of wealth and a plot to deceive a New York Times reporter. It’s very Noel Coward-like but not as believable.
Although I found the acting good, I found the play boring. There were a couple of characters I enjoyed: Alpha Campbell Jackson (Tonia Jackson), a spitfire who schemes to collect money from her deceased mother’s former employer, Grace Dunbar (Trezana Beverley); and Janet Logan (Jasmine Guy), a reporter who has come from New York to spill the beans on what it’s like to be black and living in high society in the South.
Cleage is an award-winning playwright. After last week’s opening night’s performance, a jazz band played in the lobby while crowds surrounded her, raving about the show.
“The Nacirema Society Requests the Honor of Your Presence at a Celebration of Their First One Hundred Years” runs through Nov. 14 at the Alliance Theatre.
Cast
Trezana Beverley
Kevin Alan Daniels
Andrea Frye
Jasmine Guy
Chinai J. Hardy
Tonia Jackson
Karan Kendrick
Naima Carter Russell
Neda Spears
Freddy Cole will be celebrating his Birthday Bash this Tuesday at Café 290 in Sandy Springs.
Just back from touring in Switzerland, Cole and his band will be playing standard jazz tunes and numbers from his newest release, a tribute to Billy Eckstine titled “Freddy Cole Sings Mr B.”
Jazz Times critic Christopher Loudon writes that Cole’s delivery on the CD “is not just impeccable but rather profound.”
Cole, who turned 79 last week, grew up in Chicago with three older brothers, all musicians. Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Lionel Hampton all visited the brothers.
Brother Nat “King” Cole, 12 years older than Freddy, was the first of the four to make a name in the music business. But his baby brother stands on his own. He has been inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame, and his CD “Merry Go Round” was nominated for a Grammy.
Cole studied at the Juilliard School of Music and received a master’s degree from the New England Conservatory of Music. His musical influences include John Lewis, Oscar Peterson and Teddy Wilson.
On Monday, Cole will share the stage for a couple of numbers with Joe Gransden’s 16-piece Big Band. Tuesday, Cole will play two sets with his own quartet, which features guitarist Randy Napoleon, bassist Elias Bailey, and drummer Curtis Boyd.
In a production called “Sammy & Me,” it would be normal to think you’d see the likeness of Sammy Davis Jr. But in the Alliance Theatre’s production, co-written and performed by Eric Jordan Young, you won’t.
Young tries to reincarnate Sammy Davis Jr., but he does not come close. Forget that he’s way larger than the petite singer and dancer was. In the theater, size does not matter. But acting does.
Young can act, he really can, and he’s a very good actor in this performance. The problem is you don’t think for a moment that this guy is Sammy. In the 35 characters Young plays in his one-man show, I believe he is a little boy, I believe he is a young man, I believe he is a grandfather. And I believe he can sing. But as I overheard a woman tell someone else as they were walking out of the theater, “You never believe he is Sammy.”
When I think of Sammy, I think of playfulness, jokes and slapstick. You won’t find many laughs here.
“Sammy & Me” opens with a young performer reading a newspaper critique of his new Sammy Davis Jr review. The news is not good.
Next, we see the performer as a toddler, charming his daddy to let him stay up just a little bit longer to watch Sammy on TV. We meet the boy’s father and grandfather, and we see the performer shake and shudder as the ghost of Sammy Davis Jr. enters his body.
Young can act and sing just fine. He’s like the toddler longing to be like Sammy. The sad thing is: he can’t.
“Sammy & Me” plays at the Hertz Theatre at Woodruff Arts Center through Oct. 24.
The Atlanta performance features a three-piece band. The above video is from the show’s world premiere in 2006. Click here to see a more recent video and to go to the “Sammy & Me” website.
“Sammy & Me” was written by Wendy Dann and Eric Jordan Young.
George Grier, bass; Tommy James, piano; Scott von Ravensberg, drums.
Photo by Greg Mooney
In its third incarnation, a musical from a book can work. Just recently Aurora Theatre produced “Shrew: the Musical.” And if you went there thinking nothing could possibly be as good as Cole Porter’s musical version of Shakespeare’s “Taming of the Shrew,” you were in for a wonderful surprise.
If you care to see “Twist,” the second musical version of Dickens’s “Oliver Twist,” you probably won’t be saying, “Please, sir, I want some more.” Less than halfway through the second act, I was ready for it to be over.
Directed and choreographed by Debbie Allen, I expected so much more from this show. I would have even been glad to have settled for a good production, if not great. Allen apparently doesn’t hold the cast up to the same standards she holds for herself as a performer.
In the 1980s, Allen was nominated for two Tony Awards for her roles as Anita in “West Side Story” and Charity in “Sweet Charity.” She has also been a judge on my favorite TV show “So You Think You Can Dance” and has choreographed for the Academy Awards. She is even working to pass on her passion through her own dancing school in Los Angeles.
Allen was nominated for two Tony Awards for her roles in “West Side Story” and “Sweet Charity.” She has also been a judge on my favorite TV show “So You Think You Can Dance” and has choreographed for the Academy Awards. She is even working to pass on her passion of dance through her own dancing school in Los Angeles. So, I expected to be blown away by the dancing. But you wouldn’t want to put these dancers on next to those in last season’s production of Twyla Tharp’s “Come Fly With Me.”
Like “Oliver!,” “Twist” is a musical version of Dickens’s classic tale “Oliver Twist.” But instead of being set in England in the 1800s, it occurs in New Orleans between 1919 and 1928.
At an orphanage for boys, Twist (Alaman Diadhiou) is bullied by his peers and caretakers for being a “mulatto.” His black father was killed for having a romantic relationship with a white woman, and his mother died in childbirth. At around age 8, an undertaker buys the unwanted Twist from the orphanage for a couple of dollars. The undertaker makes him sleep alongside the deceased and returns him to the orphanage because he says the boy can’t dance.
I should feel sorry for this boy and the other orphans, but I don’t. Whether that is the fault of the script or the acting, I am not sure.
“Oliver!” is one of those musicals that envelop you inside the characters. You hate Bill Sikes, you love Oliver, Nancy and the Artful Dodger. But with “Twist,” the feeling I had for the characters was nil, even though Della (Olivia-Diane Joseph), is one heck of a singer.
It’s an admirable theme for a show: The color of one’s skin should not matter. It worked beautifully for me in the recent national touring company’s version of “South Pacific,” and it was just as fantastic when I saw the Lincoln Center version televised on PBS just weeks later.
Unfortunately, “Twist” comes off as preachy and boring.
Some of the dancers – many who hail from Allen’s Los Angeles dance school – are good, but some of them are just OK at best. Much of the acting feels pushed and unbelievable, especially that of the young boys who recite lines as if they were “acting” instead of living. However, one standout among the boys is Trey Best, who comes alive and lives truthfully under imaginary circumstances on stage no matter what he is doing.
The day I saw the show, Twist sang a wonderful, touching rendition of his opening number, “I Have A Soul,” but he faltered on other solo tunes with a shrieking, cracking voice that often trailed off key.
The most outstanding performer, Della, who plays the live-in girl friend of the abusive Boston (Matthew Johnson) – the take-off characters of Nancy and Bill Sikes from “Oliver!” – sings beautifully with emotion and is one of the most believable actors on the stage.
“Twist” would have been more enjoyable with another twist, just a musical review of the best cast members singing and dancing. Better yet, just give me Debbie Allen.
“Twist” runs at the Alliance Theatre through Oct. 3.
Book by William F. Brown; Music by Tena Clark and Gary Prim; Lyrics by Tena Clark.
Cast
Zaire Adams
Paul Aguirre
E. Wade Benson
Trey Best
Sabrina Cmelak
Alaman Diadhiou
Nickolas Eibler
Duane Asanté Ervin
John Fisher
Kyle Garvin
Michael George
Jared Grimes
Shawna M. Hamic
Beau Harmon
Chantel Heath
Matthew Johnson
Olivia-Diane Joseph
Jamie Katz
Tracy Kennedy
Chandler Kinney
Aijia Lise
Chase Maxwell
Rikki McKinney
Pat McRoberts
Madison Minniti
Chondra La-Teaste Profit
Malaiyka Reid
Brett Sturgis
Dougie Styles
Melissa Lola Youngblood
Kelly Grant
Some cast members of the Broadway touring company of “Phantom of the Opera” will perform a one-night-only cabaret of standard musical theater songs, as well as some new and rarely heard tunes, this Monday at Theatrical Outfit’s Balzer Theater at Herren’s.
Cast members have performed on Broadway and in national touring companies and have sung with pop stars and opera companies around the world. They have also sung at the Spoleto, Aspen and Eastern Music festivals.
The associate conductor for the National Tour of “Phantom” and former conductor for the National Tour of “Evita,” David Robison, will serve as musical director and pianist.
Songs will include “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” “All That Jazz,” “Dirty Old Man,” “Sit Down You’re Rockin’ the Boat,” “Send in the Clowns,” a “Merry Poppins” medley, and other tunes by the most popular Broadway composers. No songs from “Phantom of the Opera” will be performed, and some songs may include strong language or address adult themes.
Phantom cast members expected to perform include Dara Adler, D.C. Anderson, Kelly Jeanne Grant, Luke Grooms, Michael Scott Harris, Satomi Hofmann, Juliette Javaheri, Anne Kanengeiser, Silvio Scambone, Pamela Shandrow, Kim Stengel and Elizabeth Welch.
The production is a benefit for Synchronicity Threatre’s Playmaking for Girls, a community outreach and mentor program for underserved tweens and teens.
Broadway Sings for Synchronicity will be held Monday, July 12 at 8 p.m. at Theatrical Outfit’s Balzer Theater at Herren’s in downtown Atlanta. Tickets are available at Synchronicity Theatre.
“Phantom of the Opera” plays through July 18 at the Fox Theatre.
If “Phantom of the Opera” is not the greatest musical ever, there must be some other reason it is the longest running Broadway show in history.
Now at the Fox Theatre, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical is an eerie love story based on the 1911 novel by Gaston Leroux about a chorus girl, Christine Daaé (Trista Moldovan), and a haunting ghost, the Phantom (Tim Martin Gleason).
The Phantom has been haunting the opera house for years. When new managers take over, he demands that they replace the star of the opera with Christine.
A former musical genius with a disfigured face, the Phantom lures Christine to him and takes her on a gondola ride on a lake to his lair. When he returns her to the opera house to perform, she vacillates between her love for him and her new love interest and childhood friend, Raoul (Sean MacLaughlin).
The play can be difficult to follow at times. Words are not always discernible. But it’s well worth the struggle to try to pay attention to the lines and what is going on above the set. Sometimes, the Phantom’s voice seems to come from somewhere far off, and since there is no spotlight pointing him out, you need to look closely to find him on the roof of the opera house.
Although the lyrics are sometimes incomprehensible, especially when two or more people are singing different words, the music is beautiful. Webber weaves pumping percussions, rock and opera to create unforgettable tunes, such as the lullaby “Think of Me,” and Billboard chart-toppers “Phantom of the Opera” and “All I Ask of You.” The original London cast recording is the highest selling cast album in history.
The design is by the show’s original designer, Marie Björnson, who won “Phantom” two Tony Awards: one for Best Scenic Design and one for Best Costume Design. Backdrops portray exotic locations like India, a life-size elephant appears on stage, and a jet-size lighted chandelier floats to the rafters of the opera house and later plummets to the floor. Colorful gowns with swaths of blue, green, red and gold brocade drape opera characters and recall the dress of earlier centuries in France and Spain.
On the cast album and in other productions Christine is the standout, but in this production it is Gleason, who performs in a tux with black coattails and a white mask that covers half of his face. While other characters are sometimes difficult to understand, his annunciation is perfect and his singing voice is outstanding. He moves like a dancer displaying his love for Christine, and he is a charming suitor who tugs at the heartstrings. But when she snatches the mask off him, he instantaneously metamorphosis into a creature that resembles Dracula.
“Phantom of the Opera, opened in London in 1986. After it opened on Broadway in 1988, it won seven Tony Awards, including one for Best Musical. The show is still running in both locations. The show is still running in both locations.
The touring company production is directed by the show’s original Broadway director, Harold Prince, who himself has won 21 Tony Awards. “Phantom of the Opera” is completing its sixth and final Southeastern trip for Webber’s touring company, The Really Useful Company, according to the playbill.
Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber; lyrics by Charles Hart; additional lyrics by Richard Stilgoe.
“Phantom of the Opera” runs through July 18 at the Fox Theatre.
If you have seen “Kiss Me Kate,” you may wonder why you should see Georgia Shakespeare’s “Shrew: The Musical.”
Don’t wonder. Just see it.
I know you’re thinking, “What could best the Tony Award-winning production by Cole Porter?”
Quite possibly the script and lyrics of John R. Briggs and original music arrangements of Dennis West.
Sure, both shows are similar takeoffs of “Taming of the Shrew.” But Briggs, who says he has never seen “Kiss Me Kate,” writes in the program notes that his version is different because it takes place in Miami and is a musical adaption of Shakespeare’s play within a play, unlike Porter’s production, which is about a theater troupe performing “Taming of the Shrew” and the action that takes place behind the scenes.
“Shrew: The Musical” basically sticks to Shakespeare’s story. Bianca (Ann Marie Gideon), has just become of age to wed. But her wealthy father, Baptista (Allen O’Reilly), declares that no one may wed her until her older, raucous sister Kate (Park Krausen) is first married.
While suitors vie for Bianca’s attention, no one courts Kate. That is until Petruchio (Joe Knezevich) comes to town to find a woman whose hand in marriage will bring him a fortune. No matter that the two quarrel incessantly and she wants nothing to do with him, the two wed.
“Shrew: The Musical” employs modern language that is simple to understand. The show recalls life and characters from decades gone by and musicals like “No, No, Nanette” and “Guys and Dolls.” Damon Runyon-type characters with New York and Cuban dialects dress in Sinatra-style fedoras and Gatsy-era fashions, and bring back Vaudeville and the jazz era with brief imitations of Durante, Groucho and Sinatra.
Briggs says he and West wrote the music as an homage to the Gershwins, Duke Ellington, Johnny Mercer and Fats Waller. One tune has a swinging Stray Cats flair to it, and one is a celebratory gospel number. The music and script are tight and full of life.
While the singing and acting are good, the dancing falls short. The performers know the steps but lack the energy that should encompass them. The music is fiery and Jen MacQueen’s choreography is fine. If the dancers would spit fire when they danced, this show would be more than smoking. It would be a blaze.
“Shrew: The Musical” runs in rep with “Love’s Labour’s Lost” and “King Lear” at Georgia Shakespeare through August 6.
