Drew Eberhard - Page 8

Like an ode that harkens back to the great a?oeAlma Mater'sa?? of yesteryear one truth rings out loud above them all, and that is a?oelove an acceptance above all.a?? Love what you have and work with what you got, and make your best in the world no matter what life throws your way. This and more is the centralized theme surrounding the story of the not-much done and surprisingly overlooked busking type musical BKLYN which took center stage at the HCC Ybor Campus Friday night. SLT or more formally known as Spanish Lyric Theatre pulls out all the stops in this Tour de Force which is aptly carried in the hands of five amazing performers and aptly dealt from the hands of his appropriately penned a?oeStory-tellera?? hands Derek Baxter, and all involved should be commended. Baxter has become a staple in the Tampa Bay Theatre scene with such visionary productions of Jekyll & Hyde, and Disney's The Little Mermaid. He does the same here with the no-nonsense, no-frills but completely captivating production of this musical which can be described as The Field of Dreams of Musical Theatre, where if you build it they will come! Going back to pulling out all the stops, SLT even invited Broadway Star and the Original Brooklyn from the Broadway production Eden Espinosa to opening night. After listening to Eden last night speak about how emotionally moved she was from this performance, I knew SLT had a Golden Ticket with BKLYN.

A special VIP event on February 7, will be held at 7pm at the HCC Mainstage Theatre prior to the Tampa debut of Brooklyn, the Musical. After the show, Miss Espinosa will share her thoughts on the production during a talkback.  Then on February 8, Miss Espinosa will conduct a master class from 9am-12 pm also at HCC. This intimate experience will allow 14 performers to sing a song of their choice and receive individualized feedback from Miss Espinosa. Observer tickets are also available for purchase. Observers will be able to watch the entire session, as well as participate in the Q & A.

The time is 1946, the place a showroom in a modest funeral home. Let me reitterate; the time is 1946, a time where Racism is alive and well. 2 actresses take the stage and for the next 95 uninterrupted minutes we are strapped in for a ride unlike any other through faith, Gospel, love, family, and coming to grips with who you are, 1946 feels a lot like today in a show so resonating and moving if you blinked you'd miss everything. A modest funeral home amongst the casket sits an upright piano, a guitar case, an amplifier, a podium adorned with sheet music and numerous suitcases with clothes strewn about. This sets the scene for the pivotal and moving story laid before us. Eric Davis Artistic Director of freeFall in his opening curtain speech informed the audience that an immediate replacement was needed for the role of Rosetta Tharpe and within 4 rehearsals the replacement took the stage in front of a sold-out crowd on opening night. Now in times like these you sit and wonder about the forthcoming endeavor, but all worry subsided when the ladies playing Rosetta Tharpe and Marie Knight graced us with their presence and incapsulating beautiful vocals that rendered the room speechless with every note.

Auntie Mame not to be confused with Mame the popular musical version tells the story of the life of Mame Dennis and her orphaned nephew Patrick over the course of 18 years of time. Mame Dennis a swinging and very progressive woman with a zest/zeal for the finer things in life is left to be the guardian of her late brothers young boy. Teaching the boy about the finer things in life and a laundry list of new vocabulary Mame leaves nothing to the imagination for this young boy to be brought up in a world unlike that of which he's known. The script by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee is based on the novel by Patrick Dennis; which lends itself to some funny, touching, and endearing moments.

From a Kabuki drop and into the world of Agrabah the audience Friday night was completely swept up in a glamorous spectacle that continued throughout the evening. From moving set pieces, a flying carpet, and stunning costumes all the stops were pulled out for this production. Not one minute of this high flying production allowed for the audience to be underwhelmed. The choreography was perfectly in sync, and the voices matched and blended so seamlessly, it was hard to catch your breath from all the jaw dropping performances laid before you, as this cast truly like a well-oiled machine left everything on the stage.

3 tapestry panels, of multi-color and tribal patterns adorn the backdrop of a minimalized set surrounding the story of two women of color in their 30's. The women subliminally named SBF 1 and SBF 2 enter the space and like a conversation over Friday night cocktails with friends the show commences. A 90 minute riff on Modern Pop culture references touches on several decades in the young women's lives. The 19 century Modern woman in the 1970's, 80's, and 90's are described through comedic and sometimes endearing vignettes. Fluid Expressions a newer Theatrical Company in the Tampa Bay area who's missions is, a?oeArt for the conscious mind,a?? chose Lisa B. Thompson's script for their season opener, and through solid performances by the two women, the audience enjoyed their evening.

An old fashioned hearing aid and a strong willed woman at its helm with dreams as big as the universe she wishes to discover is one of many centralized themes presented in this brilliant staging of Lauren Gunderson's Silent Sky at American Stage Theatre. At the center of the stage two desk faced by numerous books on shelves in a workspace for women at Harvard University, where women are paid a mere .25 cents on the hour to a?oecomputea?? and manually log the patterns of stars in the galaxy given on glass plates by their male counterparts. At this point in Harvard's history women were not allowed to work alongside the men no matter their prior education or status. Men had their place, and women had theirs and men liked to make sure the women knew their place in the hierarchy. It was one women's dream to be credited amongst the likes of men in the Astrology department, and through sheer will power she set out to prove just that.

Upon entering the space the audience is immediately surrounded by the dwellings of a castle. The beautiful set design by Tom Hansen lent itself well to this harkened tale of Christmas in England. Henry II, King of England and his ward Alais are seen talking about their love and the King donning a Blood Red Crown that has been exquisitely crafted to the finest detail. Soon we meet the three sons of King Henry, Richard Lionheart, John and Geoffrey. All three are bastards in the eyes of King Henry and all three feel their stake at the Crown is higher, and more deserving than the others. Whether written into the script or a Directors choice, the use of Christmas carols, both modern and Baroque was a nice touch and lent itself well to the story and made scene changes seamless. A nice touch from the set design was having the pieces of the King's table fly in from up above and added nicely to the set. The texture of having the candles on every inch of the set, gave the castle a warm feeling and made it also feel very elegant and regal.

Gothic, Spooky, and down right Mind-Bending are just three words used to describe the deeply affecting, and resonating performance during freeFall Theatre's enigmatic opening to their 19/20 Season a?oeGhostlight.a?? Upon entering the theatre the audience is immediately incapsulated in a world of Gothic Noir. Like something bursting out of a?oeMidnight in the Garden of Good and Evila?? and blended well with real water, the stage was set and the mood was placed for an eerie and beautiful trip. Over the next enthralling 75 minutes two actors of supreme grandiose proportions took the audience on an unforgettable trip across the pond to Essex, and the opening night audience in mere sell out lingered on every word. Even a chill in the air lent itself to the spooky good time set before us. A true tour-de-force helmed exceptionally well by Director Timothy Saunders, two characters simply named a?oeMana?? and a?oeWomana?? took our breath away and left a chill down our spine that still resonates with me days later.

There's always onea??one slight chance of a failed attempt at a good thing. Like the end of a show that has been so climactic up and down, left and right, that binging the entire season in one sitting is a no brainer. Only to find that the ending you have been longing fora??the ending you've spent countless hours trying to reach is a mere upset, and for that the entire plight of sitting on the sofa or in the lazy boy connecting with the characters seems like time you'll never get back.

Not very often does a piece of theatre come along that is truly cathartic, visceral and downright unnerving, but humbling as well. Summer Bohenenkamp's direction of Nick Payne's cathartic masterpiece Constellations does just that. The perfect closer to an unforgettable season at Jobsite Theater, the resident theatre company at the Shimberg Playhouse at the Straz Center. This show truly embraces everything Jobsite is about and in my honest opinion is the show of the Season! For a piece of work as visceral as this to unearth emotions deep inside and show a true honest take at the human emotion deeply resounded in a relationship, makes for an unwavering and unforgettable 85 minutes.

We all know the beloved classic story written by J. M Barrie that had us all wishing we could never grow up, and reaching to find a way, "second star to the right, and straight on till morning." What if however, there was a different side to the story? A story stripped of all the Disney magic and theatrics and left with a guttural, heartbreaking tale, of love, loss, and the unique idea that even when you don't want to grow up…we all have a way of doing so in the end.

How does a book so grounded in popularity in Young-Adult fiction, that was then translated to a 2 film series, transition its magical storytelling to the stage? These and more are the questions I asked myself upon entering Morsani Hall Tuesday evening for the opening of The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical. As a fan of the book series, and having seen the films a few times, I was skeptical at best. Upon finding my seats and purusing the program I found 10 actors making up the subsequent company of the show before me. Little did I know that each character minus Percy, would be doubling as several other characters throughout the night. At a talk-back immediatelty following the show, one actress said she had upwards of 21 costume changes throughout the show which can be an astounding feat. Having little knowledge of the music in the show I sat back and was ready to embrace the adventure. Usually I find myself listening to the Cast recordings prior to seeing shows, however with this one I wanted every surprise available to me.

Everyone knows the story, and or has seen the classic film starring a young Christian Bale. A group of boys left to live on the street, or find ways to scrounge up a little money to feed their parents, and their only source of notable income is to sell papers. With a money-hungry tyrant raising the cost of papers, the boys decide to go on strike to change the ways in which society is run and hopefully for once make it past, or above the fold to the front page of the paper! Change the headline, change society that is the scene set forth by Jack Kelly and the Newsies for this explosive Disney Musical that was a smash on Broadway, and that which has now taken Ferguson Hall at the Straz Center by storm and left the audiences singing and dancing all the way home, and for some even after the show has closed.

In the traditional sense, dance, and art-forms alike are put on stage to evoke feeling and emotions from the audience. However what happens, when a Professional Company who gained major popularity from their show stopping performances on America's Got Talent, turn the tables on their dancersartist as well?

Before the high-flying, energetic production of Newsies put on by the Patel Conservatory takes the stage at Ferguson Hall, I had the chance to sit down with Director Suzanne Livesay and Student Performer Jaden Waz and discuss the show and what makes it memorable to all who see the show.

[St. Petersburg, FL] - This summer, freeFall will be closing out their 20182019 season with the classic Broadway musical Pippin. Long a contender for inclusion in our season, Artistic Director, Eric Davis is excited to present a new staging of this beloved musical which features an energetic, funny, and moving score by Wicked composer Stephen Schwartz and was originally directed on Broadway by the legendary Bob Fosse.

A high flying, high kicking romp of a good time comes full steam ahead back to the Straz Center in Tampa for three days only from May 17-19, 2019. A true story set in North Hampton England just a stones throw from London centers its story around the plight of a burgeoning entrepreneur whom was just bequeathed the family business. Price&Sons is known for their comfortable and dependable classic shoes for men. When sales plummet and stock is filtering back in by the truck load it is up to Charlie the heir to the shoe factory to pull the company back on its struggling feet and restore the name of Price &Sons to its glory. How does one do that you may ask?

The setting strikes a chord with the audience upon entering the space. Hardwood floors, a simple flat set to the backdrop of the Brooklyn Skyline. The time is the 1950's the season, fall. Five actors/actresses tell the plight of this family in a struggling neighborhood in Brooklyn, and the events that envelope them truly show the heart, and passion inside each and every one of its' centralized characters.

Seven Performers enter, a Pianist is introduced. Set to the backdrop of the history of the Great White Way from past to present, and set to a gut punching-hilarious score based off of one of the greatest musicals to date Spamilton took off full speed ahead. From hilarious lyrics devised by the great minds behind Forbidden Broadway, and including a Lin-Manuel look a-like the audience experienced 90 minutes of unadulterated laughter, song, and dance.