Photo Flash: Reagle Music Theatre Presents HAIRSPRAY
By: Gabrielle Sierra Aug. 13, 2010
Reagle Music Theatre continues its 42nd consecutive season with Hairspray! This winner of 8 Tony Awards, including Best Musical, is set in the city of Baltimore in 1962 in the time of John F. Kennedy's presidency. It is the tale of that chubby integrationist Tracy Turnblad and her dreams of dancing her way to the top on the local Corny Collins Show (a "Dick Clark-Bandstand" clone!), kissing the boy of her dancing dreams and changing the world while she is at it! All of this, of course, is achieved without missing a beat or mussing her hair. The tale is timeless and has a bit more on its mind than sheer fun. It targets social issues like the need to fit in and racial and body type prejudice. The show, both romantic and funny, maintains a satisfying balance of reality and camp.
Joining busy Tracy as she transforms the world is her shy and plus sized Mom, Edna, portrayed by an actor doing a grand drag turn in the role. Edna rises like the phoenix from the Baltimore doldrums in a delightful transformation from frump to fashionista! Paris Hilton move over! Laughs abound as this unusual but heartwarming duo takes audiences on a roller coaster ride through the social mores of the sixties. And all of it is set to a driving and insistent beat, inspiring energetic and memorable song-and-dance moments. Many have called Hairspray one of the best musicals of the past decade. To be sure, the entire show is plus sized entertainment!
Songsters and master stylists Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman have created original tunes that pay homage to the grand sounds and lyrics of the 60's pop charts. Much of the score mimics the musical styles of the era. The great fun ranges from girl group sounds to teen angst pleas for freedom. Along the way, the authors intersperse some nifty specialty delights like the vaudevillian turn - "Timeless to Me" and the anthemic eleven o'clock number "I Know Where I've Been." Audiences rock to the rhythms of "You Can't Stop the Beat", "Listen to the Bells", "Mama I'm a Big Girl Now", "Run and Tell That", "Without Love", "Hairspray," Welcome to the 60's" and the rousing opener "Good Morning, Baltimore."
In Hairspray - the 60's milieu reigns with glimpses of beehive hairdos, backstage Bandstand antics, dance crazed TV show personalities, racial integration, raging teen hormones and lots of nostalgia! It's a feel-good trip back in time exploring where we have been and where we are going - all packaged neatly in a fulsome song-and-dance fest.
The terrific Marissa Perry wiggles once more into her Broadway role as Tracy Turnblad. The effusive Perry was a replacement Tracy in the Broadway run of this six year hit. Ms. Perry brings her expansive talents once more to this winning role and recreates it for regional viewers. Audiences fall quickly for this plus sized heroine with her plus sized heart, voice and dance moves. Also starring: Dan Dowling Jr. as Edna Turnblad, John Macero as Wilbur Turnblad, Mark Linehan as Corny Collins, Angela Birchett as Motormouth Maybelle, Susan Scannell as Velma Von Tussle, Stephanie Moskal as Amber Von Tussle, Nick Peciaro as Link Larkin, and Merissa Czyz as Penny Pingleton, Davron S. Monroe as Seaweed, Rebecca Policape as Little Inez, and Lovely Hoffman, Samantha Johnson, and Kami Smith as the girl group trio - "The Dynamites." The entire production is directed and choreographed by Todd Michel Smith and Judine Somerville, both six year veterans of the Broadway Hairspray cast.
For more info visit: http://www.reagleplayers.com/upcoming.html#Hairspray
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