Legally Blonde National Tour Comes To OCPAC 9/8, Tickets On Sale 7/10

THE FIRST NATIONAL TOUR OF LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL will begin performances at the Orange County Performing Arts Center on September 8. LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL follows sorority star Elle Woods, an underestimated blonde who doesn't take "no" for an answer. When her boyfriend dumps her for someone more "serious," Elle puts down the credit card, hits the books, and sets out to go where no Delta Nu has gone before: Harvard Law. Along the way, Elle proves that being true to yourself never goes out of style.

Tickets to LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL are $20 - $80 and go on sale July 12. They will be available online at OCPAC.org, at the Center's Box Office at 600 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa or by calling 714.556.2787. For inquiries about group ticket discounts for 15 or more, call the Group Sales office at 714.755.0236. The TTY number is 714.556.2746. The 2 p.m. performance on Saturday, September 19 will be sign-language interpreted.

Bank of America is the Title Sponsor of the Center's Broadway Series. Cox Communications is the Media Partner of the Broadway Series and Mercedes-Benz USA is the Premier Sponsor of the Orange County Performing Arts Center's 2008-2009 Season.

In its first year on Broadway, LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL earned seven 2007 Tony® Award
nominations, ten 2007 Drama Desk Award Nominations, a 2007 Outer Critics Circle Award and the
chorus of the musical was honored by Actors' Equity Association's Advisory Committee on Chorus Affairs (ACCA) with the first ever ACCA Award. The musical also ranked in the top ten list of the most requested Ticketmaster "Arts & Theatre Events" for 2007. LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL received three 2009 Touring Broadway Awards in New York City on May 4, 2009. The show won awards for Best New Musical, Best Production Design and Best Choreography of a Touring Production. The Awards, presented by The Broadway League, honor excellence in Touring Broadway. It is the only such national award.

Becky Gulsvig, the Elle understudy in the original Broadway cast, is Elle Woods in the tour. Gulsvig was recently seen on the 63rd Tony Awards performing a song from LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL. Fans of the MTV reality show Legally Blonde The Musical: The Search for Elle Woods, which premiered on June 2, 2008, will recognize two familiar faces in the tour casting: Third runner-up Rhiannon Hansen plays Elle's best friend Margot and fourth runner-up Lauren Zakrin is an ensemble member and understudies the role of Elle. The reality show represented the musical's second venture with MTV. In the fall of 2007, MTV aired LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL in its entirety to stellar ratings and the broadcast show was subsequently nominated for two 2007-2008 Daytime Emmy Awards.

The original Broadway cast recording for LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL was released on Ghostlight Records, an imprint of Sh-K-Boom Records, and captured the No. 1 slot on the Billboard Cast Album chart and charted at No. 86 on the Billboard Top 200. The album has continued its success, charting every week as one of the top-selling Broadway cast recordings and it soared to the Top 10 albums (of any genre) on iTunes once the show premiered on MTV.

As on Broadway, Tony Award-winner Jerry Mitchell is the director and choreographer. Music and lyrics are by both Laurence O'Keefe and Nell Benjamin, and the book is by Heather Hach. The production features scenic design by David Rockwell, costume design by Gregg Barnes, lighting design by Kenneth Posner and Paul Miller, orchestrations by Christopher Jahnke and sound design by ACME Sound Partners.

LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL is produced on tour by Hal Luftig, Fox Theatricals and Dori Berinstein, in association with MGM Onstage, Darcie Denkert and Dean Stolber. For more information visit LegallyBlondeTheMusical.com.

The Orange County Performing Arts Center presents a wide variety of the most significant national and international productions of music, dance and theater to the people of Southern California. It is
committed to supporting artistic excellence on all of its stages and offering unsurpassed experiences, engaging the entire community in new and exciting ways through the unique power of live performance and an array of inspiring programs. As Orange County's largest non-profit arts organization, the Center owns and operates the 3,000-seat Segerstrom Hall and intimate 250-seat Founders Hall, which opened in 1986, and the 2,000-seat Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, which opened in 2006 and also houses the 500-seat Samueli Theater, and the Lawrence and Kristina Dodge Education Center's studio performance space and Boeing Education Lab. These state-of-the-art facilities are united by a community arts plaza.

The Center's Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall and community plaza, along with facilities of the adjacent Tony® Award-winning South Coast Repertory and a site designated as the new home of the Orange County Museum of Art, are located at Segerstrom Center for the Arts.

The Orange County Performing Arts Center presents a broad range of programming each season for
audiences of all ages from throughout Orange County, and beyond, including international ballet and dance, national tours of top Broadway shows, intimate performances of jazz and cabaret, contemporary artists, up and coming indie bands, classical music performed by renowned chamber orchestras and ensembles, family-friendly programming, free performances open to the public from outdoor movie screenings to dancing on the plaza and many other special events.
It offers many education programs designed to inspire young people through the arts. These programs reach more than 500,000 students of all ages with vital arts-in-education programs, enhancing their studies and enriching their lives well into the future.

The Orange County Performing Arts Center is proud to serve as the artistic home to the region's major performing arts organizations: Pacific Symphony, the Philharmonic Society of Orange County and the Pacific Chorale.

For more information, visit OCPAC.org. The Center can also be found online at Blogger, YouTube,
Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and Flickr.

Box Office information:
600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa, CA
Tickets: $20 - $80 Tickets on sale July 12
In person - The Center Box Office

600 Town Center Drive
Costa Mesa, CA 92626

Open 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. daily
Online - OCPAC.org
Phone - 714.556.2787
Open 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. daily
TTY number - 714.556.2746
Group Sales - 714.755.0236

Photo credit Joan Marcus

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