Carla Maria Verdino-Süllwold - Page 2

“We perform in parking lots, restaurants, tents, bandshells, and lovely venues like this one,” declares Maine State Music Theatre’s Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark. He is addressing a full house in the Lunt Auditorium at Oceanview at Falmouth on May 30. It is only one of over 95 free public outreach events that MSMT offers in the course of each year,  but today is special because it introduces the new 2024 crop of MSMT Singers in their second public performance since arriving in the state. An outgrowth of the company’s former intern program, the MSMT Singers are an elite group of young (college age) professionals selected by Clark in an annual nationwide search that has holds over 3000 auditions for eight spots. “These young artists have to sing, dance and act on a scale of at least an 8 out of 10 when they come here,” Clark explains, “and when they leave, I expect that they will have grown into the stars they are going to be.”  

Respectful of the show’s legacy and sensitive to contemporary context, Maine State Music Theatre has mounted a stunning revival of the Rodgers and Hammerstein classic, SOUTH PACIFIC.  Marshalling the company’s considerable artistic resources, this 75th anniversary production is musically glorious, visually lush, and packed with emotion and talent.

“SOUTH PACIFIC is a masterpiece, and the role of Emile de Becque is an important one.  He is a man who hates war, has found his slice of peace, and is willing to fight for love.  It is such a joy to play the part and be able to fall in love eight times a week.”  Baritone William Michals is sharing his thoughts about MSMT and Fulton Theatres’ new co-production of SOUTH PACIFIC which opens MSMT’s 65th season on June 6, 2024 (Previews June 5).  His enthusiasm for the project is shared by his co-star, Carolyn Anne Miller, who plays Ensign Nellie Forbush. “I have fond memories of the show from the records my grandmother, who was an actor, used to play.  I knew all the songs by heart, and it is a thrill to play the role for the first time.”

Portland Stage joins forces with the Dramatic Repertory Company to revive Tony Kushner’s multiple award-winning 1991 drama, ANGELS IN AMERICA, in a production that Artistic Director Anita Stewart proudly calls “all Maine-made.”  The company has shouldered the huge task of presenting the sprawling seven-hour epic in two parts, the first of which “Millennium Approaches” proves its ability to create a powerful emotional impact long after its premiere.

“The world is coming back online, and people are getting back to who they were before the pandemic,” declares MSMT Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark. “Ticket sales are as close as they have come to pre-pandemic levels, and there is an extraordinary buzz surrounding the upcoming 2024 season.” 

What did our critic think of JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR at Merrill Auditorium?

Maine State Ballet revives one of its favorite classics, CINDERELLA, in an elegant and ageless production with the choreography of Linda MacArthur Miele and the design wizardry of Gail Csoboth.  The production, grounded in the Balanchine tradition in which Miele was nurtured, is eloquent in its disarming simplicity of narrative and timeless traditionalism of its dance.  Set to Serge Prokofiev’s stirring score, Miele’s eighty minutes of dance offers an afternoon of enchantment.

Portland’s Good Theater poetic, poignant revival of the Ahrens/Flaherty musical, A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, exquisitely directed by Brian P. Allen, marks several memorable milestones for this company which has been a jewel in Portland’s theatrical scene for twenty-one seasons.

Katie Forgette’s bittersweet memory play about a Catholic childhood in the 1970s takes the stage at the Public Theatre in Lewiston in a gently funny and touching production directed by Janet Mitchko.  INCIDENT AT OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL HELP focuses on the O’Shea family, a prototypical middle class Irish-American Catholic family, who grapple with the daily struggles of making ends meet, raising two daughters, and caring for each other within the context and constraints of their Catholic upbringing and community. The universality of the characters, and their quest for compassion and forgiveness gives the work its heart.

Portland’s Good Theater newest production is a side-splittingly funny, perfectly timed farce with ancient roots in Italy’s Commedia dell’Arte, Richard Bean’s ONE MAN TWO GUVNORS.

The Good Theater presents a fresh take on its annual musical revue, BROADWAY AT THE GOOD: THE TWIN PIANO EDITION, this time honoring six seminal musicals from Broadway’s Golden Age, performed by a sprightly company of nine under the direction of Brian P. Allen, who conceived and directed the show and serves as its charming emcee.

Portland Stage opens its fiftieth season with a warm, witty, insightful new play by one of Maine’s most original voices, Monica Wood, in a stylish production directed by Sally Wood. Portland Stage’s commitment to new work has been an enduring one, and surely one of the theatre’s brightest new endeavors has been to nurture the playwrighting talents of Monica Wood. Her latest work, SAINT DAD, is a polished and poignant play about the intersection of people from two very different worlds brought together by the sale of a family camp in rural Maine and the journey they take individually and collectively to reach some transformative epiphanies.

The Good Theater opens its 21st season with a luminous production of Matthew Barber’s poignant 2017 play about the flickers of late-life romance, expertly directed by Brian P. Allen, starring Valerie Perri in a nuanced, delicate and incandescent performance. FIREFLIES, as the title and central metaphor suggest, draws a subtle portrait of the sparks that simmer repressed in a lonely woman’s soul, only to be kindled by the attentions of an erratic, but appealing drifter who comes into her life and enables her to shake off decades of claustrophobic expectations.   Barber draws his four characters with great insight and empathy, and though the ending may be fated from the start, keeps the audience guessing as to the directions the principal pair will choose.  His dialogue is wry, laced with a warm wit and tender pathos, and he manages to infuse every moment of the week-long action with palpable emotion.

The Public Theatre in Lewiston opens its 2023-24 season with the world premiere of Cary Crim’s latest work, PAINT NIGHT, a heartfelt exploration of the complexities and conflicts that confront mothers and daughters in our contemporary world.  The six-character play, directed by Janet Mitchko, strikes some familiar chords and appears to resonate with the theatre’s audience.

The MSMT Singers, the spectacularly talented group of young professionals in residence at Maine State Music Theatre all summer, bid farewell to Brunswick with two splendidly crafted and performed cabarets at the Freeport venue, Cadenza. The eight performers were able to showcase their triple threat talents and the new skills they honed all summer, in a program of musical theatre song and dance.

The record crowd who came out to fill the Brunswick Mall and celebrate the final week of the theatre company’s 2023 season were treated to a summer’s evening of joyful song, performed by the stars of SOMETHING ROTTEN! (the current main stage production) and the MSMT Singers. The concert, presented in conjunction with the Brunswick Downtown Association and funded in part by a gift from the Maine Arts Commission, featured sixteen selections from the musical theatre repertoire and was emceed by MSMT Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark with his customary flair.

Maine State Music Theatre closes its TYA series with an imaginative revival of Robin & Clark’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND. The third children’s production of the season features a young cast – local actors ages 11-18 from the theatre’s Summer Intensive program and the MSMT Singers - in a colorful, clever production that combines song, dance, and puppetry

“As an actor, I have a huge sense of play, and this show is very much that. It’s really like a fun game of tennis with lots of back and forth. We don’t always know what is going to happen until we are in the moment, declares Tyler Hanes, who portrays Shakespeare in SOMETHING ROTTEN!, the musical which closes out MSMT’s 2023 season. Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark concurs, “SOMETHING ROTTEN! is like a game I love to play; it teases you verbally, vocally, and instrumentally to name those Broadway musicals. It is so much fun!” “It is everything I love about musical theatre all in one show,” agrees Lucy Godinez, who plays Bea Bottom. “It’s joyful; it’s fun; there is love. The sense of play in this show gives you the license to fill in the blanks.” Bryant Martin, who plays Nick Bottom, adds that not only is the show great fun with lots of great musical numbers, but it also “speaks to the struggle all artists have dealing with validation. Nick asks why his peers are having success and he isn’t. It’s a situation with which we as actors can easily resonate.” The foursome are serving on a panel moderated by BWW World Maine Editor, Carla Maria Verdino-Süllwold, at MSMT’s final Peek Behind the Curtain on August 16 at Brunswick’s Curtis Memorial Library to discuss MSMT’s hilarious production of SOMETHING ROTTEN! And judging by the laughter in the room, the large audience agrees that the musical by Karey and Wayne Kirkpatrick is not only clever and hugely funny, but a crowd-pleasing hit.

Dancing omelettes, a zany soothsayer, THE Bard of English theatre, and a ragtag troupe of Renaissance actors struggling to survive all share the Maine State Music Theatre stage in dizzying profusion in the final main stage production of the season: SOMETHING ROTTEN! - an outrageously funny, simultaneously urbane and plebeian send up and homage to classical theatre and that unique genre the MUSICAL. The stylish and brilliant co-production with Lancaster’s Fulton Theatre, directed by Marc Robin, creates an entirely new imaginary universe, a world at the intersection of Elizabethan England and modern American musical theatre – part Renaissance Faire (on steroids), part Monty Python at their most hilarious. The evening, which is filled with endearing characters, showstopping song and dance numbers, comedy fueled by allusions, puns, slapstick, scatological jokes, and occasionally even poetry, is pure entertainment. No one will need to “brush up his Shakespeare” or be able to “name that tune” in order to come away from SOMETHING ROTTEN! thoroughly exhilarated and brimming with joy.

“Whether you get all the references or not, this show is still smart and funny. It’s a little like HAMILTON, which creates a gateway into history, in that it offers the audience a gateway into theatre. It makes them interested in the art form as a whole,” Bryant Martin says. “And the audience will be impressed with the singing and dancing – with the pure spectacle of what they are seeing on stage. There is something in this show for everybody from the book to the musical aspects,” concurs Tyler Hanes. Hanes, who plays William Shakespeare, and Martin, who portrays his rival playwright and theatrical producer, Nick Bottom, are waxing enthusiastic about SOMETHING ROTTEN!, the last main stage show of Maine State Music Theatre’s 2023 season which begins performances on August 9th.