Elliot Lanes - Page 2

Today’s subject Anita Yavich is currently living her theatre life both locally and on Broadway. Her costume designs can currently be seen in Roundabout Theatre Company’s current production of Yellow Face and starting October 25th her work will be onstage at Kennedy Center in the Opera House with Washington National Opera’s (WNO) production of Fidelio. The show runs through November 4th.

Today’s subject actress Joanna Glushak is currently living her theatre life on tour in the rip-roaring good time board game gone theatrical version of Clue. She plays the wealthy socialite Mrs. Peacock. The show plays through October 6th in the Opera House at Kennedy Center.

The Four Seasons had a hit song many years ago with a lyric that went “Oh! What a Night!” That is how I can best describe watching singer/songwriter/actress Sara Bareilles with YOUR National Symphony Orchestra (NSO), under the always stellar direction of Maestro Steven Reineke in Kennedy Center’s Concert Hall.

Every once in a while, you see the billing for a concert and think to yourself “That’s an interesting combination”. This was my exact thought at Wolf Trap with Broadway superstars Kristin Chenoweth and Alan Cumming on the same bill. Don’t get me wrong, their talent is not to be questioned. It’s more the fact that Kristin Chenoweth has a very squeaky clean Christian raised wholesome personality while Alan Cumming is more no filter. Based on that, the evening felt like two different concerts with me and my wife enjoying one half of the program more than the other.

The National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) began their classical season this past Saturday evening in a very satisfying manner. The program was entitled Echoes of America and was conducted by the Artistic Director of The Washington Chorus Eugene Rogers.

Cirque Du Soleil is one of those attractions that is not easily explained because it has elements from many entertainment genres. Their shows have a very theatrical quality to them while melding circus elements in as well. At their core is fine storytelling, really good production values and dazzling circus skills. Another plus is that their shows always boast an international cast and crew. You will notice where each performer and artist come from in parenthesis throughout this review.

This past Monday the theatre world lost someone who was arguably one of the finest performers of all time. Most people knew James Earl Jones as the voice of Darth Vader in the Star Wars movies or from the film Field of Dreams but for those of us who live and breathe theatre, we will always remember his performances onstage.

When summer ends many people get depressed. Let’s face it, you can’t go to the beach or your private summer home for another year. However, you can look on the bright side of things knowing that the end of summer brings a new season of audible brilliance from the mighty National Symphony Orchestra (NSO). This past Saturday evening, the NSO Pops season opened with a bang as Tony Award winning performer Heather Headley made her Kennedy Center Concert Hall debut. The evening featured lots of show tunes, a choir, a TV vocal competition winner, and most importantly, YOUR NSO under the baton of Maestro Steven Reineke.

Today’s subject, Danny Troob, has been living his theatre life for over 50 years as an accomplished orchestrator and dance music composer. You can currently hear his orchestral brilliance in Signature Theatre’s production of Soft Power. The show runs through September 15th in The MAX.

Christine Sherrill is currently living her theatre life spreading the gospel of the joys of ABBA in the US National Tour of Mamma Mia! where she is playing the lead role of Donna. The show is currently running now through September first in the Opera House at Kennedy Center.

It’s been 40 years since the national tour of the 1982 Arthur Kopit/Maury Yeston Tony Award winning Broadway musical Nine played at the Kennedy Center. It is currently the latest entry into the Broadway Center Stage series and boasts an all-star cast, a large orchestra and an “interesting” concept by director/choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler.

Today’s subject Burke Swanson is currently living his theatre life playing the iconic role of George McFly in the North American tour of Back to The Future The Musical. The show is currently playing in the Opera House at Kennedy Center through August 11th.

Recently I wrote a Broadway World feature dealing with a partial restoration of Robert Ginzler’s original orchestrations for Bye, Bye, Birdie at the Kennedy Center by conductor John Bell with additional work by Joshua Clayton. When the piece was shared on social media, it started a bigger conversation about proper credit for the original orchestrator. Robert Ginzler was somehow never acknowledged in the Kennedy Center program.

Today’s subject Abigail Bengson is one half of the singer/songwriter folk song performing group known as The Bengsons. Their songs and music are currently helping to underscore and tell the story for Jeff Augustine’s play Where The Mountain Meets the Sea. The show is currently running in Signature Theatre’s ARK space through July 7th.

Today’s subject Salar Nader is currently living his theatre life as the Tabla Artist in the national tour of The Kite Runner. The show will conclude it’s tour in the Eisenhower Theater at Kennedy Center starting on June 25th and playing through June 30th.

The latest entry into Kennedy Center’s Broadway Center Stage series is one that you don’t see produced professionally very often which is a good thing. The 1960 Charles Strouse/Lee Adams/Michael Stewart musical Bye, Bye, Birdie was at one point the most produced musical by high schools and community theatres but strangely it has had very few large-scale revivals. Roundabout Theatre Company’s production in 2009 marked the last time the show was seen on Broadway in a major production.

Nowadays orchestra size has become more and more of an issue for me. Even when seeing productions of classic Broadway musicals, there is a tendency to reduce the size of the orchestra for more in the way of production elements. It’s even worse when a production “reimagines” the charts completely and wipes away the work of Robert Russell Bennett, Don Walker, and even Jonathan Tunick. The latter should be deemed sacrilege.

Today’s subject Simon Godwin is currently living his theatre life as the Artistic Director of DC’s Tony Award winning Shakespeare Theatre Company (STC). He assumed the position in 2019 succeeding the company’s founder Michael Kahn after a stunning 33-year reign.

Today’s subject Stephen Cole is an accomplished lyricist, performer, and book writer. You can now add novelist to that already impressive list of accomplishments. Stephen Cole’s latest literary endeavor takes us back to the Golden Age of Broadway with his first novel entitled Mary & Ethel…and Mikey Who?. The book is now available everywhere for purchase in both hardcover and digital versions.

As we all know, the 23/24 Broadway theatre season has been one of the busiest in a very long time with many new plays and musicals opening within a short period. One of those shows was The Notebook. It features a score by pop writer Ingrid Michaelson and a book by Bekah Brunsetter. The show had a pre-Broadway tryout in Chicago where it was met with unanimous rave reviews.