Broadway audiences didn’t know what they had in their midst when a new rock and roll musical, dealing with high school angst, drama, and romance, opened at the Eden Theatre in 1972. Six years later, the iconic film was released, a subsequent sequel, and two more Broadway revivals. When Grease gets done nowadays, it takes a strong vision and harnessing of nostalgia (and assumed nostalgia) for the title and the material to seem urgent, relevant, and applicable. Now, with respec

One of the earliest jukebox bio-musicals in our modern era is Alan Janes’s Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story, a show that brings so many highlights of the era and titular singer with his band, The Crickets, to stage. The show really knows no version of “medley,” which expedites the running time in favor of the audience's attention span to hear the hits while not sitting through a full presentation of the artist’s life. However, director Mark Standriff has helmed a production that

Among the two times I’ve previously seen Dear Evan Hansen on stage–and that film we don’t talk about–I’ve never been able to crack why there’s such a hardcore love for and connection to Evan. To be fair, I was bawling when I first saw it on Broadway, but it was due to Michael Park’s (as Larry Murphy) hard-hearted softening in the finale of act one that got me. Platt nailed the role, but I didn’t walk away feeling more than entertained by a mostly great score. However, Shine!

I find the stage adaptation of Mary Poppins to be an absolute delight by being one of the stronger screen-to-stage adaptations in the Disney canon. The songs and plot hold true when done right in front of you, and the added plots and tunes service the whimsy of Poppins and Bert while supporting the lessons learned for the Banks family. Good Company Players is tapping away with a marvelous production of this classic, making this the very spoonful of musical theatre sugar you’l

A vibrant, poignant, and thoroughly entertaining production of Godspell is blessing the Fresno State University Theatre stage. John Michael Tebelak and Stephen Schwartz's parables set to music invites audiences to experience Jesus’ teachings while enjoying skit-style scenes and songs which take a vibe, a verse, or a plot point and give its musical due. Director J. Daniel Herring, in choreographic collaboration with Kenneth Balint and the cast, is delivering a superb, smart, a

Good Company Players is currently running an absolutely loverly production of the Lerner and Loewe classic, My Fair Lady . The story, on paper, is nearly outdated in its acceptance of gender and class roles; specifically how it assumes the higher position of privilege at the expense and degradation of those in the lower. But, when helmed by a director with a sharp eye for when those in power can be laughed at rather than with , audiences are in for a treat as entertaining as

Masquerade (#926) Thanks to the graciousness of my wife, I was able to finagle a trip in time to see the closing of The Phantom of the Opera before it left The Majestic Theatre a few years back. I was transfixed by the stage craft, engulfed in the story, and swept up by hearing the score and seeing the company deliver an iconic piece of mega commercial theatre. When I saw Masquerade , a currently running immersive iteration of … Phantom …, my guest and I had just one comment

While many Golden Age musicals are reaching the end of their mainstream relevancy, The Sound of Music only grows in its urgency while...

Disney’s Frozen is making its Central Valley premiere at Good Company Players, and this production serves as a frozen respite from the...

My first trip to Minnesota afforded me the pleasure in seeing The Guthrie Theater’s currently running production of Cabaret , a musical...

Just a year shy of this nation’s semi-quincentennial is a new production of 1776 playing at Roger Rocka’s Dinner Theater. Easier to say...

Just closed at American Conservatory Theatre was a world premiere hip-hop musical, Co-Founders; a very energetic, hometown hype of a...

TheatreWorks Silicon Valley is premiering a new musical adaptation, Come Back to the 5 and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean: A New Musical. ...

Seeing a show like Luigi: the Musical affords audience members to curb a sadistic appetite for seeing how a fastidiously written show can...

"Oh, the thinks you can think!" This oft-repeated phrase in Seussical: the Musical is a motivating, inspiring message that securely...

The Berkeley hills are alive with the sound of music in a riveting production of the Rodgers and Hammerstein II classic. The opening...

Jukebox bio-musicals offer audiences a chance to experience an artist’s story and music performed by a cast of dedicated performers who...

Conversations with Mother (#900) My NYC 2025 trip kicked off with a Monday night showing of Conversations with Mother , a wonderful play...

Serving up a delicious Central Valley premiere is Good Company Players’ production of Waitress, an adaptation of the 2007 Keri...

There’s something to be said when a musical knows exactly what it is. Such is the case for the premiere of the new musical, Dysfunction ,...