Following on the heels of Mary Rodgers’ best-selling 1972 children’s book “Freaky Friday,” which spawned two Disney movies, one starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan, comes the new musical “Freaky Friday.”
The play differs from the movie, but the premise remains. A teenage daughter, Ellie (Abby Holland), and her widowed mother, Katherine (Jennifer Alice Acker), both think the other has life so much easier and wish to trade places with the other for just one day. A magic spell makes it happen.
Katherine, in Ellie’s body, gets a first-hand look at high school life and goes weak at the knees over her daughter’s high school crush, Adam (Christian Magby). Ellie, in Katherine’s body, feels the opposite about her mom’s fiance, Mike (Frank Faucette), and averts his romantic moves by offering him fist bumps instead of kisses.
A live band plays the music, which hails from the Pulitzer Prize-winning composers of “Next to Normal” and “If/Then,” Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey. The script was written by Bridget Carpenter, whose writing credits include “Friday Night Lights” and “Parenthood.”
My best friend from high school, J.P., who became a high school teacher enjoyed the show and said the students acted the way her students behaved. She and many other audience members seem to have fallen under the magic spell that switched mother and daughter.
J.P. said I didn’t fall under the spell because I can’t relate to high school, but that’s not true. I thought “Bring It On,” about two competing high school cheerleading teams, was one of the best musical plays I’ve seen on an Atlanta stage.
As for the musical “Freaky Friday,” I enjoyed a few fine performers in the cast of 19 actors, most of whom play multiple characters. Acker, Magby, Brittani Minnieweather, and Jill Hames stood out for their singing and acting, and Randi Garza and Jeff McKerley stood out for their acting.
Book by Bridget Carpenter, directed by Heidi Cline McKerley, “Freaky Friday” runs through April 22 at Horizon Theatre.
Other cast members:
Cat Catlin
Daniela Cobb
Miranda Dyer
Sloka Krishnan
Hannah Lake
Amy Levin
Joseph Masson
Shaun MacLean
Russell Scott
Juan Carlos Unzueta
Alexis Young
One of Atlanta’s greatest jazz bands, the Joe Gransden Big Band, performs Monday at the Georgia Ensemble Theatre in Roswell. Trumpeter and singer Gransden normally hits a slew of great standards, including those by Ol’ Blue Eyes and Ella, and plays a few original tunes.
Holding a regular gig for years at Cafe 290, Gransden’s band has played in clubs around the country, including in New York at The Blue Note, but it will be nice to see him in a quiet setting where everyone will be tuned into the music. And Gransden plays such great music.
Tickets are available for Monday, March 12 for $30 at the Georgia Ensemble Theatre.
This Saturday four Jewish comics, an Italian-American, an African-American, an Indian and a Vietnamese-American, take the stage at the MJCCA to perform their stand-up routines.
Mike Capozzola, Gina Gold, Joe Nguyen and Samson Koletkar will share their own experiences about being “undercover” members of the tribe.
The comics will perform this Saturday, Feb. 10 at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Contact the MJCCA for tickets.
The Koresh Dance Company will be performing next weekend in Atlanta. Called “one of the best contemporary companies in Philadelphia” by the Broad Street Review, the choreography blends ballet, modern, and jazz with Israeli folk dance.
Reviewers around the country have called the choreography “eccentric,” “hot,” “hip,” “turbocharged,” and have said viewers leave “bedazzled.” The company, which tours internationally, was founded in 1991 by Israeli-born choreographer and artistic director, Roni Koresh. He trained at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York City, and in 1984 he began performing with Shimon Braun’s acclaimed Waves Jazz Dance Company in Philadelphia. Koresh won a People’s Choice Award in 1987 as Philadelphia’s Most Outstanding Jazz Dancer.
The Koresh Dance Company tours nationally and internationally. Koresh is a multi-year recipient of choreography fellowships from the Pew Charitable Trusts, the Philadelphia College of Performing Arts and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. His choreography has been commissioned by numerous dance companies across the country.
The Koresh Dance Company performs Saturday, Jan. 27 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Jan. 28, at 5 p.m. at the Marcus Jewish Community Center Atlanta.
Rachel Sorsa, Mark Cabus. Photo: Dan Carmody/Studio 7
Georgia Ensemble Theatre hits it out of the park with “Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical.” The famed singer of the 1950s and ’60s struggles to overcome depression, an addiction to pills and a loveless family. Clooney starts out as a young girl singing duos in Kentucky and continues singing even as her starlight has faded. A talented musical trio backs up Clooney (and the other characters) with her greatest hits, including “Come On-a My House,” “Botch-a-Me,” “Mambo Italiano,” and “Hey There.”
The two-person cast features Rachel Sorsa as Clooney and Mark Cabus, who plays a string of characters, including Clooney’s psychiatrist, sister, mother, and movie actor husband José Ferrer. Cabus portrays the young girl and older women and the male characters in a truthful manner so they are all believable. Although the dancing is not the greatest, the singing and acting are first-rate.
Written by Janet Yates Vogt & Mark Friedman, directed by James Donadio, “Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical” runs in Roswell, Ga., through Jan. 28 at Georgia Ensemble Theatre.
Prudes beware: “Hand to God” is no genteel puppet show. Think of the raunchiest scenes from “South Park,” “Book of Mormon” and “Avenue Q,” multiply by two, add some crude language, sex with a minor, Penthouse puppetry and comedic, maniacal characters, and you’ve got yourself a show that received five Tony Award nominations, including one for Best Play.
This is a fast-moving show about a schizophrenic boy, Jason (Ben Thorpe), his seedy highly sexed mother, Margery (Wendy Melkonian) a church pastor, Greg (Allan Edwards) and the church’s puppet-making class. There are scenes, such as the one in which the pastor fights an unruly puppet by spraying holy water on him, that are laugh-out-loud funny, and there are sex scenes that will turn many cheeks pink.
I think back in my twenties or thirties, I would have found this irreverent comedy more amusing. Still, the stellar performance by Thorpe, who plays both a shy, introverted teenager and a puppet besmirched by the devil, alone makes this show worth seeing.
Written by Robert Askins, directed by Marc Masterson, the Alliance Theatre’s production of “Hand to God” runs through Nov. 12 at Dad’s Garage.
Cast:
Alexandra Ficken as Jessica
Patrick Wade as Timothy
“The Color Purple,” the two-time Tony Award-winner, including Best Revival of a Musical, will be returning to Atlanta this month at The Fox. The original Broadway production, which ran from 2005 through 2008, earned 11 Tony Award nominations. The Broadway revival opened in late 2015 and ran through early 2017, winning two 2016 Tony Awards—including Best Revival of a Musical. The original Broadway-bound musical began its first run in 2004 in Atlanta at the Alliance Theatre.
Based on the 1982 novel by Alice Walker, the show follows the journey of Celie, an African-American woman in the American South from the early to mid-20th century. Book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Stephen Bray, Brenda Russell, and Allee Willis, “The Color Purple” runs Oct. 24-29 at the Fox Theatre.
“The Girl Who Needed Watching” is an alternate title for the classical ballet “La Fille Mal Gardee,” which translates to “the poorly guarded girl.” Publicized as one of the most important classical ballets by critics and dance professionals around the world, the comedic storyline focuses on a young girl, Lise (Kelsey Stanhope), who falls in love with a local farm boy, Colas (Josiah Savage), but her mother has arranged an engagement to a rich but clumsy and slow-witted-son of a vineyard farmer. The playful story about a mother keeping an eye on her young love-struck daughter mixes cartoon-like playfulness with romance.
The chickens, who peck and dance, are played by dancers who appear to be in their teens. To me, they are the most amusing part of the show. The mother, Widow Simone (played by a man, Matt Rice), is also amusing and is very over-exaggerated with her facial expressions and movements, reminding me of a cartoon character from the 1960s. But it works and doesn’t seem overdone.
Ballet is supposed to look effortless and smooth, and that is often not attained in this production. If you’re looking for the quality of dancers you’d find with the Atlanta Ballet, you won’t find it here. However, you will find a show that would be nice for children.
Based in Marietta, The Georgia Ballet teaches a variety of dance classes for children as young as age 3, as well as for adults. I don’t know if I’d return for another production, but I look forward to taking the adult ballet class.
Original choreography by Sir Fredrick Ashton, staged by Daet Rodriguez and Margit Peguero, music by Ferdinand Herold, “The Girl Who Needed Watching” runs through Oct. 8 at Marietta Performing Arts Center. Tickets can be purchased at the event or online at GAB.
If “The Christians” is not the best performance I’ve ever seen at Actor’s Express, it’s certainly one of the best. The script, set and acting are outstanding.
Inside this megachurch where Pastor Paul (Brian Kurlander) preaches a sermon, which begins with “Where we are today.” The church has just paid off its debts stemming from its enormous building and parking lot. He segues into a heart-wrenching story about love and acceptance, and the religious message is unlike any ever before, rankling some staff and congregants.
The stage where the pastors preach looks like the set of a televangelist. Sitting close to the pulpit are Pastor Paul’s wife (Kathleen Wattis Kettrey), Associate Pastor Joshua (Enoch King) and a church Elder (Greta M. Glenn). I feel like I’m in church, but the play does not feel preachy at all. When Associate Pastor Joshua (Enoch King) says, “Please bow your heads and pray,” I feel like doing it.
Pastor Paul’s sermon splinters the church. Associate Pastor Joshua, board member Elder (Greta M. Glenn) and choir member Jenny (Sarah Newby Halicks) all challenge his reasoning. His wife questions his intentions. Conflict abounds, but it never feels gratuitous, and all the while Pastor Paul stays as calm, kind and reasonable as a wise old sage.
The set, by Isabel & Moriah Curley-Clay, makes you feel like you’re right there in church with beautiful stained glass windows and an enormous cross nearly as tall as the building.
Directed by Freddie Ashley, written by Lucas Hnath, “The Christians” runs through Oct. 15 at Actor’s Express.
