Photo Flash: New Line Theatre Presents CELEBRATION

New Line Theatre, "the bad boy of musical theatre," opens its 26th season of adult, alternative musical theatre with the world premiere of a new revised version of the wild, 1969 adult jazz-rock musical CELEBRATION, by the creators of The Fantasticks, running Sept. 29-Oct. 22, in the company's new home, the Marcelle Theater, the new blackbox theatre in Grand Center, St. Louis' arts district.

Tom Jones, bookwriter-lyricist for Celebration, will visit St. Louis during the run to see New Line's production.

It's the freakiest New Year's Eve party you'll ever attend, from the legendary team of Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt (The Fantasticks, I Do! I Do!, 110 in the Shade). CELEBRATION tells a wacky, adult fable set on New Year's Eve, centered on Orphan, an idealistic and cheerfully optimistic young man; his opposite, the wealthy and jaded old man William Rosebud Rich; Angel, a sweet but not so angelic erotic dancer who longs to be Somebody; and the cynical con artist Potemkin, who serves as narrator, commentator, and instigator.

The cast of New Line's CELEBRATION includes Kent Coffel as Potemkin, Zachary Allen Farmer as Rich, Sean Michael as Orphan, Larissa White as Angel, with Colin Dowd, Sarah Dowling. Christopher Lee, Todd Micali, Nellie Mitchell, Michelle Sauer, and Kimi Short. The show is directed by Scott Miller and Mike Dowdy-Windsor, with music direction by Sarah Nelson, choreography by Michelle Sauer, scenic design by Rob Lippert, costume design by Sarah Porter, sound design by Benjamin Rosemann, and lighting design by Kenneth Zinkl.

Celebration contains adult language and content, and some partial nudity.

THE BACKSTORY

Back in 1968, with the profits from their hits The Fantasticks and I Do! I Do!, composer Harvey Schmidt and writer Tom Jones opened the Portfolio Studio in New York, where they could experiment with the modern musical as an art form, away from the economic pressures of Broadway and off Broadway.

Their first experiment there was the ritual-based musical CELEBRATION, a marriage of "holy" theatre and "popular" theatre, a story based on an ancient Sumerian rituals (no kidding), with a villain originally based on the widely despised Broadway producer David Merrick. The writers had been working on the show, off and on, since The Fantasticks had opened in 1960, but kept putting it aside for other projects. Earlier attempts were called Ratfink and The Bone Room. Full of masks and symbolic props, Celebration was inspired by legendary director Peter Brook's work in England.

At the end of his introduction to the 1973 published script, Jones wrote, "We did Celebrationfirst at our Portfolio Studio. It felt good there. It belonged. When we moved it into the Ambassador Theatre on Broadway, it didn't feel as good. It seemed somewhat silly up there, not because it was less effective than a Broadway musical, but because it wasn't a Broadway musical. Who knows? Perhaps we will do it again someday. With revisions. And in a proper place."

Tom Jones has given New Line Theatre the honor of finally premiering that revised Celebrationhe envisioned all those years ago, right here in St. Louis.

Jones also wrote about the show itself. "Celebration is different from The Fantasticks. For one thing, it is mostly in prose. For another, it requires a bit more explanation. It is 'different' from other musicals. In fact, I'm not even sure it is a 'musical' at all. Not in the usual sense of the word. It is a fable. It has ritual overtones. It is based upon ancient ceremonies depicting the battle between Winter and Summer. It was suggested by an editorial in the New York Timesabout the meaning of the Winter Solstice. It annoyed the hell out of some people. It delighted others. It ran for only 109 performances on Broadway. But it is done often around the country and the world. And it has been phenomenally successful in Scandinavia (where the Winter Solstice is something to be reckoned with.)"

CELEBRATION opened on Broadway in January 1969, and Clive Barnes wrote in the New York Times, "Once upon a time - for this is a fable - a man called Tom Jones and a man called Harvey Schmidt sat down and pondered. They pondered and they pondered. They pondered on what was wrong with the Broadway musical, and they decided (at least this would be my guess) that it lacked simplicity, magic and uplift. Last night the curtain rose on their Celebration, which might be thought of as unpretentiously pretentious fairy tale for adults."

TICKETS

CELEBRATION runs Sept. 29-Oct. 22, on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evenings, at 8:00 p.m., at the new Marcelle Theater, 3310 Samuel Shepard Drive, just three blocks east of Grand, in Grand Center. Sept. 29 is a preview. Tickets for mainstage shows are $25 for adults and $20 for students/seniors on Fridays and Saturdays; and $20 for adults and $15 for students/seniors on Thursdays.

ABOUT NEW LINE THEATRE

New Line Theatre is a professional company dedicated to involving the people of the St. Louis region in the exploration and creation of daring, provocative, socially and politically relevant works of musical theatre. New Line was created back in 1991 at the vanguard of a new wave of nonprofit musical theatre just starting to take hold across the country. New Line has given birth to several world premiere musicals over the years and has brought back to life several shows that were not well served by their original New York productions. Altogether, New Line has produced 78 musicals since 1991, and the company has been given its own entry in the Cambridge Guide to American Theatre and the annual Theater World. New Line receives funding from the Regional Arts Commission and the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.

For other information, visit New Line Theatre's full-service website at www.newlinetheatre.com. All programs are subject to change.

New Line's season also includes Zorba, March 2-25; The Sweet Smell of Success, June 1-24; and Out on Broadway: The Third Coming, Aug. 3-19.

Photo credit: Jill Ritter Lindberg

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