Jeffrey Ellis - Page 46

Nashville's summer theater season continues its fast clip with tonight's opening of the blockbuster musical Thoroughly Modern Millie at The Larry Keeton Theatre in Donelson. Running through June 25, the tap-happy musical features Keeton favorite Stella London in the title role of Millie Delmount, with Austin Jeffrey Smith and Tyler Samuel playing Jimmy and Miss Dorothy, respectively.

Who would have ever thought a musical about urban planning could be as effective and engaging, and as thoroughly compelling (if somewhat confusing and confounding, by turns) as If/Then, the latest work from the Pulitzer Prize-winning (for next to normal) duo of Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey?

Savannah Gannon makes a startling - and, no doubt, star-making - debut as country music superstar Patsy Cline in the Matt Smith-directed production of Ted Swindley's play with music Always, Patsy Cline, now onstage at Woodbury's Arts Center of Cannon County through June 18.

Although the calendar tells us we're still in the spring season, things are quickly heating up in Nashville - theatrically speaking - and theater-goers have a plethora of shows coming up from which to choose, including some summer musicals that are sure to set feet a-tapping and a classic drama that's sure to provoke more thought and discussion than perhaps ever before.

Summertime is here, what with Memorial Day and all that it encompasses, and we can think of no better seasonal activity than taking in some local theater. No matter where you are in the Volunteer State, Tennessee theater companies are ready and willing to help transport you to a different world, another time and place where your life can be is transformed magically on a stage very near you!

Nashville's Circle Players unveils the first regional production of The Little Mermaid, the new musical that's sure to be on virtually every stage in Middle Tennessee in the next year. Lipscomb Academy grad Hatty King takes on the role of Ariel, under the direction of Brittany Blaire Andersen, who makes her Circle Players directorial debut with the production.

Savannah Gannon and Mary Ellen Smith star in Arts Center of Cannon County's Always Patsy Cline, the award-winning play by Nashville's own Ted Swindley, opening tonight and running through June 18 in Woodbury. The show's a favorite among Tennessee theater-goers, and now's your chance to get to know director Matt Smith's two-woman cast who bring the show to life…

Opening tonight at Franklin's Pull-Tight Playhouse is the ever-popular The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, directed by Brett Myers (who last year starred as Vice Principal Panch in Circle Players' production of the show) and starring Benjamin Pendergrast, who takes on the role of Panch in this production. Find out what makes these two talented men tick - why do they think you should come see their show - and then try to score some tickets as quickly as possible.

The summer theater season in Nashville begins tonight with a revival of Charles Busch's Psycho Beach Party, which turns the formulaic beach movie of the early 1960s on its ear with a skewed and definitely crazy take on the genre. Opening at the Darkhorse Theater - the latest offering from Bradley Moore's Music City Theatre Company - it features a talented cast bringing Busch's classically campy characters to life. Today, you can get to know Gerald Pitts and Elizabeth Turner better, just before calling to make reservations to see the show!

Theaters and production companies throughout Middle Tennessee are looking for directors, crew members and cast members for several upcoming productions, including Peter and the Starcatcher at Dickson's Renaissance Players, directed by Bradley Moore, and Circle Players' Jesus Christ Superstar, directed by Jason Lewis.

Summertime is here, what with Memorial Day and all that it encompasses, and we can think of no better seasonal activity than taking in some local theater. No matter where you are in the Volunteer State, Tennessee theater companies are ready and willing to help transport you to a different world, another time and place where your life can be is transformed magically on a stage very near you!

Is it just me or is everyone else amazed by how quickly 2016 seems to be moving - in a theatrical sense, at least - and what with Memorial Day Weekend upon us, we're gobsmacked (gobsmacked, I tell ya!) by the wide range of productions offered up by Tennessee theater companies this weekend. Included are Street Theatre Company's Assassins, Center for the Arts' 42nd Street down in Murfreesboro, Rumors out at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre and the final performance of The Sparkley Clean Funeral Singers at Cumberland County Playhouse.

Savannah Gannon and Mary Ellen Smith star in Arts Center of Cannon County's Always Patsy Cline, the award-winning play by Nashville's own Ted Swindley, running June 3-18 in Woodbury.

Tomorrow's comedy stars from New York and Los Angeles will be in Nashville in late September as the Upright Citizens Brigade Touring Company performs four "unpredictable" shows at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center's Andrew Johnson Theater September 30 - October 1.

The Little Mermaid, described as "a hauntingly beautiful love story for the ages," closes out Circle Players' 2015-16 season with a June 3-19 run at Nashville's Z. Alexander Looby Theatre. Brittany Blaire Anderson directs and musical directs, with choreography by Bakari King and assistant musical direction by Kelsi Fulton. Hatty King stars as Ariel.

If there is a Broadway musical that more gleefully and accurately encapsulates the magic and mayhem of creating a brand spanking new blockbuster at the height of the Great Depression than 42nd Street, I want to see it post-haste!

Theaters and production companies throughout Middle Tennessee are looking for directors, crew members and cast members for several upcoming productions, including Young Frankenstein at Murfreesboro's Center for the Arts and Peter and the Starcatcher at Dickson's Renaissance Players.

Johnna Adams is a consummate storyteller: employing fantasy and fiction, conjecture and supposition, she weaves together a tale that is at once intensely intriguing and enormously off-putting, using her skill as a writer to transport her audience to an otherworldly place that exists only in her imagination and, perhaps, in the woods and hollows of north Georgia.

Stephen Sondheim's Assassins - his musical treatment of the history of presidential assassinations in America - remains one of the most compelling and intriguing works to be found in the musical theater canon, focusing on a veritable rogue's gallery of historic figures whose infamy lives on decades after their horrific actions first gained them the notoriety they so often pursued in their disparate, yet somehow weirdly connected, lives.

'Spring is here! Why doesn't my heart go dancing?' - or at least to the theater to be transported to a different world, another time and place where life is transformed and magic happens before your very eyes...