Review: OLIVER! at Kavli Theatre At The Bank Of America Performing Arts Center

Oliver! is a delightful, gorgeously produced classic musical by the award-winning 5-Star Theatricals company, at the Bank of America Performing Arts Center in Thousand Oaks.  Oliver! overflows with lavish staging, beautiful costuming, striking choreography, delightfully hummable songs, and a wonderful live orchestra directed and conducted by Anthony Lucca.

Based on the Charles Dickens novel, Oliver! is a show that has been a smash hit since in its premiere in London in 1960.  Oliver! is from the great midcentury era of musicals, beloved shows with big theatrical ambitions and glorious music.  This production, with great direction by Kari Hayter, feels lively and fresh, but also true to the splendid, old fashioned feel of that golden era.  Oliver! inhabits the same dark, smoky 19th century London underworld as Sweeney Todd, but with more of a My Fair Lady cheerfulness, in spite of the darkness of the Dickens story.  This production has no shortage of rollicking good fun songs and a piquant dash of cheeky, naughty humor to liven things up.

Oliver Twist is about an orphan boy’s harrowing journey through a predatory Victorian London of workhouses and criminal dens.  It was largely inspired not only by Dickens’ work as a journalist, but by his own personal life.  Charles Dickens had an idyllic early childhood that came crashing down when his father was thrown into debtor’s prison when he was twelve, along with his mother and younger siblings.  Dickens started working ten hour days as a twelve year old in a falling-down sweatshop crawling with rats, putting labels onto boot paste with other boys.  A small crowd would gather outside in the wealthy Covent Garden streets to amuse themselves by watching the boys work.

The time that Charles Dickens spent in the workhouse as a child inspired him to become a lifelong social crusader against, among other things, poverty, social class and child abuse.  Oliver Twist was a novel that shocked and horrified the world when it came out in 1838, and Dickens’ fiction inspired many essential real-life social and legal reforms.  Charles Dickens even gave the name of his workhouse friend, Fagin, to one of the characters in Oliver Twist.

Along with its impassioned social commentary, vivid characters and its shadowy Victorian world of urchins and criminals, Oliver! offers something rather uncommon among musicals, and something I think that is an indelible part of its enduring popularity — a showcase for the great charm and enormous talent of child actors.  The superb child actors in this ensemble are an absolute joy to watch in every scene.  Their big showcase numbers like “Consider Yourself” and “It’s A Fine Life” are glorious.

Kayden Alexander Koshelev is an accomplished, terrific young actor starring as lead Oliver, who has appeared on HBO, Disney+, and Netflix, and worked with superlative Hollywood film directors like Zack Snyder and Joel Coen.   He has a truly stunning boy soprano voice, astonishing in its loveliness and pure emotion.  Kayden Alexander Koshelev is suitably grubby in the part of Oliver, but also brings something luminous and ethereal in his work.  He has a wonderful simplicity in his acting that makes Oliver feel true to the heart.

So many great talents from the incredible ensemble.  Alkaio Thiele is utterly compelling, with great charisma and truly marvelous dancing and singing as The Artful Dodger.  Rianny Vasquez brings so much liveliness and sulky charm to the part of Charlotte Sowerberry, with pert and saucy chemistry with Harry Cho, wonderfully playing the vile Noah Claypole.  Her bit with the bacon was a comedic treasure.  I would have loved to see more of this awful, delightful pair.  Jesus A. Chavarria is hilarious as the doleful Dr. Grimwig, landing his lines with ingenious comic timing and expressiveness.

Award-winner Andrew Metzger brings so much quirk and eccentricity and delicious comedy to Mr. Bumble that I couldn’t get enough of this odious man.  Andrew Metzger is a wizard of an actor, stealing every scene in he is in. Janna Cardia is a fantastic actress, absolutely wonderful as the terrible Widow Corley, and she has delightful comedic and sexy chemistry with Andrew Metzger.  Their number “I Shall Scream!” is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a musical.

Fresh off her triumphant star turn in Disney’s Rogers: The Musical, Monika Peña dazzles as Nancy, with a gorgeous Broadway style voice, something vivacious, deep, life-loving, gutsy, and rare in her performance that brings tears in “As Long As He Needs Me” and doesn’t leave a toe not tapping with “I’d Do Anything” and “It’s A Fine Life.”  Monika Peña can do it all better than anyone, and in every moment, feel authentic and unique.  

This production is gorgeous to look at, with painterly, smoky, stunning lighting design by Brandon Baruch, and ingenious, textured, immersive scenic design by Escape Theatre.  The choreography by Christopher M. Albrecht is vibrant and striking, and makes the whole production leap to life.

Photos by Veronica Slavin

Oliver! runs through Sunday, October 22, 2023 at the Kavli Theatre at the Bank of America Performing Arts Center (formerly the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza), 2100 Thousand Oaks Boulevard in Thousand Oaks. Tickets available by calling (800) 745-3000 or by clicking the link below:

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