Paul Batterson - Page 9

a??a??a??a??a??a??a??Consider this entry from the 'If at first you don't succeed' department. A young television writer is recruited to write a book for the musical SHINBONE ALLEY. Haven't heard of it? That's not too surprising. It lasted a little over a month and closed on Broadway after 49 performances. Undaunted, he writes the first act for another musical, ALL-AMERICAN five years later. It also flops, closing on Broadway after 80 performances.

When the movie ANASTASIA was released in 1996, somewhere someone was humming along with the score of the 20th Century Fox film and thought 'This might make a fantastic musical.' It took nearly 20 years but the faith in the concept is paying off.

In the television show, 30 Rock, Tracy Jordan, the self-centered actor played by Tracy Morgan, decides his life-goal is to EGOT (meaning to capture Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony awards). Jordan asks Whoopi Goldberg, an EGOT winner herself, for advice.

Even after close to three decades of performing, sales of over 15 million records, twice being named as group of the year at the Juno awards, and a selection into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, Steven Page still feels he has to win his audience over at every show.

As it did at the Tony Awards, DEAR EVAN HANSEN, the 2017 award winner for Best Musical, rolls into Columbus on the tails of HAMILTON, the 2016 Tony Award winner which played in the Ohio Theatre in the Spring. Although the style of music and subject manner are hard to compare, there are many similarities between the two. The most striking of these unlikely storylines for a musical with HAMILTON taking the life of America's founding father Alexander Hamilton while DEAR EVAN HANSEN confronts many of the problems facing teens and parents currently. Like HAMILTON, DEAR EVAN HANSEN gets style points for originality with a powerful message and memorable score that stays with you for days.

The second act of the Northland Performing Arts Center & Vaud-Villities Production of KISS ME KATE opens with Cole Porter's classic 'Too Darn Hot.' It turned out to be a fitting anthem for the evening production. The temperatures hit in the high 80s-90s mark on the thermometer and the performance of the 22-member cast made the shirts of the audience sit to the back of their chairs.

When Stephen Christopher Anthony first saw the show DEAR EVAN HANSEN, he marveled at the performance of Benjamin Platt, his former cast mate in THE BOOK OF MORMON, in the title role. Platt went on to win the 2017 Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical for his portrayal of Hansen.

Midway through her opening song on June 23 at the Rumba Cafe in Columbus, singersongwriter Lucy Spraggan's eyes widened in surprise as the audience picked up the chorus of 'In a State.'

HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH, which makes its triumphant return to the Short North Stage's Garden Theatre (1187 N. High Street in downtown Columbus) this June, is a musical that thrives in its awkward pauses. It is one-part comedy, two parts heartbreaking exposition of a soul-bearing torment, blended together with a pulsating rock soundtrack.

Reality is often dirty, gritty, depressing and discouraging. Such is the case with FINDING NEVERLAND, the musical written by James Graham with music and lyrics by Gary Barlow and Eliot Kennedy. The national tour of the two-act musical takes up residency June 4-9 at the Ohio Theatre (39 E. State Street in downtown Columbus).

Performing as the Leading Player in Short North Stage's production of PIPPIN, Knicole faces a whole new set of challenges, including singing upside down from a trapeze six feet off the ground. PIPPIN, which runs from March 21-April 14 at the Garden Theatre (1187 N. High Street in downtown Columbus), could be best described as a circus. The SNS production features a host of performers in clown white as well as some Cirque Du Soleil-like acrobatics in its retelling of Pippin's search for meaning in his life.

It's with a touch of sadness that RENT celebrates its 20th anniversary of its first national tour. The national tour company of the Jonathan Larson musical about artists trying to make it big in New York City rolled into Columbus for an eight-show stay March 19-24 at the Palace Theatre (34 West Broad St. in downtown Columbus).

A friend once joked the Eagles were 'the official band of old WASP men everywhere.' To test the person's theory, another woman asked her husband, himself old, fat and balding, 'Honey, you like the Eagles, don't you?' The man, who missed out the set up of this conversation, exclaimed 'I looooove the Eagles.'

Once in every decade or so, a musical is created that redefines the genre. Lin-Manuel Miranda's HAMILTON joins that elite Parthenon of THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, LES MISERABLE and RENT. The two-act musical rolled into the Ohio Theatre (39 East State Street in downtown Columbus) on Jan. 29 pulling a 400-boxcar train of hype it couldn't possibly live up to.

The secondary headline to the Weathervane Production's GYPSY reads 'A Musical Fable.' The two-act, two-hour performance about the rise of burlesque star Gypsy Rose Lee is more of a precautionary tale for stage mothers and child actresses everywhere.

Near the front of the Playbill for the Short North Stage's production of MAMMA MIA is a list of all the sponsors for the musical based on a collection of ABBA songs. Sadly, 23 & Me is not among them.

In its latest offering, LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, the Short North Stage presents a musical that is a fine cocktail of flamboyance and subtlety and leaves its audience with a powerful, timely message without overtly stating it.

Michael James Scott must have known he had some enormous golden slippers to fill when he took over the role of the Genie in the national touring version of DISNEY'S ALADDIN, which will be in Columbus from Oct. 24 to Nov. 4. Not only will Scott be judged against the performance of the late Robin Williams, who masterfully played Genie in the movies, ALADDIN (1992) and ALADDIN AND THE KING OF THIEVES (1996), but he also had to emerge from the big blue shadows of James Monroe Iglehart who won a Tony Award for best performance by a featured actor in the Broadway musical in 2014.