Tag: arthur miller theatre

REVIEW: Next to Normal

Kayla Silverstein

In an audience of musical theatre majors, my three friends and I sat to watch a small cast of six put on a musical we’d all hoped to see, called “Next to Normal.” There was very little publicity for the event, and it was pure chance that we found out they were even doing it. I’m so glad we did because it was yet another fantastic evening of musical-wonderfulness for me!

“Next to Normal” tells the story of a dysfunctional family dealing with the turmoil of everyday life. The mother of the family is a bipolar/schizophrenic character who struggles with coping, the father of the family is in denial of pretty much everything, and the sister has to deal with regular teenage angst while being raised by two struggling, and mostly absent, parental figures. The mother’s character was, as I’m sure you can tell by her description, a definite challenge, but Chelsea Wilson was absolutely amazing. She pulled off crazy so unbelievably well. Everyone was just cast so perfectly, like C.J. Eldred as the role of Gabe and Ted Stevenson as Dan, I could hardly believe it.

Complaints bring color to a review, but I’m seriously struggling here. It was long? Yeah, 2 and a half hours, I’d say, and a few of the songs dragged, like the saga “I miss the mountains.” Unfortunately, I couldn’t just press skip this time when it came on.

The passion of the show exploded off the stage for sure, and I felt the musical shift perspectives constantly, from mother, to son, to daughter, to father. The lighting would tilt and change its tone as the melodies would lift and fall. It’s one thing to hear the recording bajillions of times, and an absolute other thing to see it performed in front of you. I’ll never hear THAT recording the same way again.

It was such a great show, and I’m so so glad I have friends who are more informed than I to tell me what is going on in the distant woods of north campus. If you read this in time, go tomorrow night!

REVIEW: Spring Awakening

Kayla Silverstein

There are those musicals that are frivolous; the ones that of course you still enjoy, but you leave saying, “Oh, that was cute!” Some leave you cross-eyed, uttering, “What did I just watch?” Then, there is Spring Awakening where you leave physically hurting, the tension of the show washing over you in waves, long after the final chords have faded away. A musical that can make you feel the magic of intimacy, the pain of betrayal, and the beauty of the human existence can be deemed unbelievable, I suppose, but even that is sort of vague and nonspecific. It was awesome, let’s call it that.

I’ve seen the show before and heard the music thousands of times; however, the School of Musical Theatre here produces and attracts such remarkable talent that I could honestly say that I’d never heard the show like those students performed it last night. Conor Ryan, as previously seen in Caberet last semester, was an extremely impressive male lead playing the character of Melchior, a “radical” who goes against the grain of the 1890s German society of restrictions, regulations, and rules against young adolescents. His acting and vocal talent is postively flawless. Erika Peterson played the female lead, Wendla, with remarkable flourish and a moving vocal performance. I would honestly say I’d rather see her play the role again than ever watch Lea Michele as Wendla, as made famous from the show Glee but previously debuted the role of Wendla on Broadway. Granted, I have only heard Michele sing the songs; however, I truly loved Peterson’s voice for the part and thought she was spectacular. Her body language when she performed was so timid yet powerful as she spent most of the show, shoulders hunched and hands laced over her stomach. It’s a hard thing to describe and I’m sort of struggling here, but just trust me when I say it worked; it just worked.

My favorite performer of the show, if I had to choose, would be Ryan Vasquez in the role of Moritz, another male lead playing side-by-side as best friend of Melchior (Conor Ryan). I loved him in the role so much and afterwards, I could not get his interpretation of the song “Don’t do Sadness” out of my head. If you haven’t seen the show, this is not going to make much sense, but he added a bunch of rifts to the song that gave it a newer and more desperate quality. I got chills. The torment of his character was evident in every movement of his body and the songs he sang. I cried at the beginning and the end for poor Moritz.

After the show ended, I wanted desperately to close my eyes, rewind time, and just watch the show over and over. It’d only been about four years since I’d first seen the show, but in no way was I numb to the passion of this show. I hope that everyone has the opportunity to see Spring Awakening at some point because it is just so phenomenal of a musical that everyone is bound to find something they adore within its contents.

Review: Little Women, Big Hearts

Danny Fob

This Friday I got out of work very frustrated and ready to go to bed, but then I walked into Arthur Miller Theater to see the Department of Musical Theatre Studio Production’s Little Women the Musical. As soon as the show started it was like I was taken back to my own childhood as we explored the adventures of the young protagonist Jo March. Her family, consisting of her mother, her three sisters, her father away at war, and the later addition of their friend Laurie, went through both hardship and joy as Jo grows up with a dream of writing. This story is famous and is a piece of classic American literature. Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott, has inspired and

moved millions of Americans and has led to the production of a movie, a musical, an opera, and a play. It is such a beautiful story and it always gets to me (I saw the opera last year) because I also have three siblings and I often feel like it is the four of us up on stage. Anyway, enough about yours truly.

The show! The music is original, magnificent, and fun. A large portion of the story takes place in Jo’s childhood, and the music reflects that perfectly. It is bouncy, fun, and sort of quirky sometimes like Jo herself. The lyrics are also cleverly written to reflect the youth and innocence so important to the story. All the actors carry out the scenes of adolescence so well. The funniest things happen and they dance around like mad, but they never break character. But of course, they are fantastic. For those who often visit the campus musical theater scene, these actors are locally renowned for great performances and you may recognize their names; Jane Bruce as Jo, Trevor St. John-Gilbert as Professor Bhaer, Ali Gordon, Samantha Massell and Paige Silvester as the sisters, Katherine Thomas as Marmee, and Harry Katzman as Mr. Lawrence (Full Cast). I preferred this version of the show to the opera, but I have a feeling that the reason is because the musical is a little more cheerful. I remember that the opera seemed really depressing and a little slow, whereas this one seemed to moved faster and, though it was sad, it didn’t leave me sad the entire night. I just cried the whole second act with a friend of mine. No big deal.

I was also excited to finally go the Arthur Miller theater. Last time I went there was for freshmen orientation! I enjoyed the set design of the show, being very open with few props. The set allowed for multiple entrances, giving it a much more interactive feel. The audience was also right next to the stage and the theater donates an almost Shakespearian theater style, taking place right among the viewers.

Although this is my not my favorite musical, I did enjoy it very much and I was so glad to go out and support all of the wonderful performers, especially since it will be my last time seeing many of them. This will also be my last art[seen] post for seven months! That’s right folks! I’m studying abroad this winter in Italy at the University of Bologna! Luckily for me, Italian is my major, which means studying abroad is basically required. But don’t worry. If you will miss me, you can see my blog posts every week because I’m moving over to arts, ink. for the semester as an ambassador abroad! So if you are looking for me online, just check out my weekly blog on the arts, ink. website. I’ll be writing about art in Italy, which obviously isn’t that hard to find.

I hope you are all worker harder than I am on exams, because I know I need to crack down. So with that, I begin yet another paper and I wish you all a wonderful holiday season. Here’s to a new year and a new country!

Sending you love and light,

Danny Fob

(Coffee is on me if you can name the show that my sign off is from!)

Seriously, read my blog at arts, ink.!

REVIEW: Little Women the Musical

Kayla Silverstein

Speaking as someone who knows Little Women the Musical, as in memorized the soundtrack, researched the musical history, and followed the actors who have played the roles in the show, the performance of the students of the Musical Theatre department fit the way I’d imagined the show nearly perfectly. It was actually a little spooky how well cast everyone was to their characters:

Jo March, played by Jane Bruce, was absolutely perfect. Quirky, lively, and strong, she played Jo March with perfection. In many incidences throughout the play, I was brought to tears by her emotional and heart-warming vocal performance and gut-wrenchingly truthful interpretation of the character.

Furthermore, the character of Marmee March, the mother of the March sisters, by Katherine Thomas, was equally as impressive. One of my favorite songs of the show is “Days of Plenty,” where Marmee urges Jo to have faith that the death of her sister Beth is not completely in vain, encouraging, “You have to believe, there is reason for hope.” She performed it beautifully and did not disappoint.

All of the characters had amazing chemistry. Laurie, played by Joel Sparks, was dorky, adorable, and lovable. He fit the role perfectly, but in a different way than I’d previously imagined his character. It was for the better, I’d say, that Laurie’s character wasn’t the dashingly handsome hero who won Amy March’s heart but brought the audience to tears when he didn’t end up with his best friend Jo. I felt his interpretation of Laurie was fitting in that you saw, even from the beginning, that Laurie and Jo would never last together, at least on Jo’s end. I think the chemistry between Laurie and Amy overpowered any feelings of disappointment that anyone felt for the lack of union between Laurie and Jo.

The role of Professor Bhaer, played by Trevor St. John Gilbert, was equally as ideal. I felt he really understood how he and Jo fell in love: amongst bickering, arguments, but in the end, beneath a shared, “Small Umbrella in the Rain.”

Even the opening scene was magnificent. They had all the characters flying through the stage, ascending and descending from all sides, and moving set pieces with ease and distinguished flair. I saw the entire play as a story, seen through Jo’s eyes, set in the magical attic of the March household. Perfection.

This musical was tremendous and the entire cast did such a fantastic job. I’m so glad I had the opportunity to see this play performed (finally!!!) and I can now put a proper backdrop behind my favored and well-loved Little Women soundtrack.

PREVIEW: Little Women the Musical [finally!!!]

Kayla Silverstein

Not even words can capture how excited I am for this performance. I want to just set up a link that’ll take you to the soundtrack as soon as you click to read my preview so you can hear just how amazing and beautiful the songs of this show are. AND what’s extra exciting about seeing this performance of Little Women is not only because it’s put on by the musical theatre dept. here but because it’s directed by UM alumnus Danny Gurwin who starred in this musical on Broadway as Laurie!!! Do you realize how awesome this show is going to be?! I don’t even think I know how great it’s going to be. The show closed on Broadway after 137 performances (thanks, Wikipedia.org) in spring of 2005, so I was forced merely to memorize every song on the soundtrack to satisfy my cravings for the beauty of this show…until NOW! Hooray!!

Performances will be December 8-11 in the Arthur Miller Theatre. I hope you find time to attend because it is going to be fantastic. Quoting from one of my favorite songs in the show, it is sure to be “astonishing.”

Read more about the performance and buy tickets here: http://www.music.umich.edu/departments/mustheatre/productions.htm

Review: Pentecost at the U!

krithika

It is such a pleasure to watch anything at the Arthur Miller Theatre as I feel that the stage there is very thoughtfully constructed. You can get a great view and it doesn’t feel cramped and the high ceiling there somehow makes the place look even more spacious than it is. And to top it all, you feel like you are at a private performance. I love that stage! And watching “Pentecost” there was very enjoyable indeed!

The play is about the status of politics and art in a fictitious post-Cold war European country.  It is a very cleverly written play.

For a summary, here goes: it all starts in an abandoned church. A museum curator brings in an English professor of art (who is a staunch proponent of restoration of art) to show him her discovery- a religious fresco that could very well change the history of  her country and thus help in proving that her country wasn’t alwasys this bad. And when news of this fresco spreads, the Catholic church, the Russian  Orthodox Church, another art professor- a  conservationist this time- and of course, the government all get involved.  To whom does the fresco belong? Should it stay in the church or be “restored”? Well, as this debate continues, a group of refugees storm into the church and hold the curator and the professors hostage. What happens to the fresco, the refugees and it all is what the play is about.

What I found most interesting was the clever way in which the large issues in politics and art came to the fore.  The characters seemed pretty isolated from one another  as if each was just alone and there wasn’t much depth to the characters. There wasn’t much of a human element in the crisis of the refugees and the theme was largely concentrated on the politics- of art, of religion and of course of politicans. But in the end,  instead of resigned depression, there is hope (with irony of course).

As for the use of the various languages, I was left with the impression that the playwright brought it in because it could be done. If the refugees had spoken in English, would it have made less of an impact to the theme? No- as the emotional  condition of the refugees by itself and hence their espression of it in whatsoever language  had very less to do in the play. Actually in the end, as the refugees are negotiating, the three protagonists figure out how the fresco might have come to be and so it appeared as if the point of the refugees was to just help illustrate a point.  So I felt that the introduction of these varied languages was more of a novelty and “it-would-be-cool-and-clever” rather than a “need-it” thing. And  how did anyone from Eastern Europe understand Sinhalese enough to interpret it? That was kind of weird.

As for this particular production by director Malcolm Tulip, it was a great performance by the actors.  The costume design was good and well-suited for the play. The set design was exceptional!  I loved the way they showed the details of discovering the fresco, the restoration and other such tiny details.  The lighting effects were great. And the actors had done a great job learning all those languages.

Overall, the play was worth it.