ORDINARY DAYS--Creative script, inventive staging and impressive performances

 
Adam Gwon, who wrote the music and lyrics for ORDINARY DAYS, which recently finished its run as part of the Playhouse Square/Baldwin Wallace annual collaboration, was in attendance at the brief 3-day run.  In fact, he has been a part of the production since an early rehearsal when he visited with the cast and creative team.  He also did a talkback after the Saturday evening performance. 

Gwon was selected as one of The Dramatist magazine's "50 to Watch" and praised by The New York Timesas "a promising newcomer to our talent-hungry musical theater with songs that are funny, urbane, with a sweetness that doesn't cloy." 

ORDINARY DAYS is a 1 hour 25-minute original musical, that “follows the contemporary and intimate experiences of four young New Yorkers as they navigate the complexities of love, loss, and self-discovery in the bustling city.  The characters grapple with personal challenges, relationships, and the pursuit of meaning and love, creating a touching and relatable narrative.”
 
The play, much like the new trend in dramatic musicals, doesn’t follow the traditional format of two-act, Golden Age of the American scripts.  It is a series of interconnected scenes, in which the characters and plot unfold through songs and no dialogue.  Think of it as an opera without the arias, overblown characters or overly dramatic plots. 
 
In ORDINARY DAYS we meet two young New York couples, Warren and Deb and Jason and Claire.  The former become acquainted when Claire, a college student loses her diary, which contains notes for her dissertation.  Jason, a free-spirited artist, with a secret to hide, who distributes square pieces of colored-paper adorned with affirmation phrases on the streets of the Big Apple.
 
After an exhausting search through the galleries of the New York Museum of Art, the duo finally gets-together to exchange the diary.  The meeting is in front of Warren’s favorite painting, a piece of art that Deb doesn’t appreciate.  Conflictual attraction takes place.  We all know where this storyline is going to go!
 
Danny BÓ, he of owl eyes, mobile face and Shirley Temple curls, is delightful as Warren.  The diminutive BW senior, who has been seen on-stage at such venues as Great Lakes Theater, Beck Center and The Idaho Shakespeare Center, has a wonderful touch for comedy and farce, and his magnetism lights up the stage.  He is definitely Broadway ready and we should see him on NY stages in a short time.
 
Jaedynn Latter, who portrays Deb, is a charming Southern California BW Musical Arts student, and a perfect match for BÓ.  She, too, knows how to play comedy and captivate an audience.  She has a fine singing voice, as evidenced in “Calm,” one of the shows highlights.  “Beautiful,” a Warren and Deb duo was captivating.
 
In contrast to the quirky Warren and Deb, Jason (Dario Alvarez) and Claire (Maggie Solimine) are the tales serious duo.  He is in love and carries an engagement ring, just waiting for the opportune moment to pop the question.  She has a deep secret that is stopping her from making a complete commitment to Jason or, as it turns out, anyone.  Their “Fine” is cute and a score standout.  
 
Both Alvarez and Solimine, as should be expected from students enrolled in one of the finest musical theater programs in the country and being trained by the likes of Victoria Bussert, the multi-Cleveland Critics Circle and BroadwayWorld-Cleveland best director awards winner and the Director of the BW Musical Theatre program, have fine singing voices and performed well. 
 
The Helen’s black box intimate theatre, Matthew Webb’s music (though I would have preferred a small orchestra to soften sound of the harshness of a single piano), and Russ Borski’s scenic, costume and lighting designs, all added to the quality of the production.
 
Gwon, says of Bussert and Baldwin Wallace, “I've always admired Vicky, for being really invested and investing her students in the process of new work...one of the things I love about writing shows is that you're really you…let other people bring their point of view and put their own stamp on it, and that to me is something that's so exciting about theatre is that every production is going to be different, because every team of people is bringing something new to the piece.

He continues, “The show is built to have that kind of openness to interpretation. It's not meant to be replicated exactly the same way every time. The script is the same, the songs are the same, but the interpretation is always so different, so, I'm particularly excited to see how Vicky's interpretation and my reaction to it will have evolved as we've evolved as people since the show came into our lives.”
 
He also stated, “One of the reasons I find Baldwin Wallace's Music Theater program so exciting is that they are…invested in what's coming down the pike, the new writers, the new musicals, which I think is such a vital part of not only the theatre community that the students are going to enter…but just the lifeblood of theatre as an art form. If we're not introducing audiences and introducing new artists to new work, we're just recycling the same old thing, and that's not how art moves forward.”

Capsule judgement:  It’s a shame that the show only ran four performances.  It is the type of production that develops a cult following and could have run on and on in an open-ended -format.  Personally, I was enamored by the script, found the members of the Downtown cast wonderful (the show is double cast, with Anthony Maja, Kenna Wilson, Luke Henson and Jessi Kirtey being the Uptown cast), and not only would I have liked to see that cast, but would have excitedly encouraged everyone to see the show!

To experience the BW Musical Theatre program students, consider attending:

Baldwin Wallace Music Theatre –A benefit in memory of Kyle Jean Baptiste
Thursday March 21, 7:30 pm
$20 Tickets HERE
 
Baldwin Wallace Music Theatre - Junior Class—A Sondheim Celebration!!
Thursday March 28 @ 7:30 pm
$20 Tickets HERE
  
Both of these programs will be @ Market Garden Brewery
1947 W. 25th Street. (In Ohio City immediately north of West Side Market)
www.marketgardenbrewery.com

Baldwin Wallace Music Theatre - Senior Showcase (the performances that students did in New Yorkfor casting directors and agents)
Monday April 29@ 7:00 pm
$20 Tickets HERE
@ Beaumont School Theater in Cleveland Heights
 

  

Lightning doesn’t quite strike at the BW-PHSquare production

 

THE LIGHTNING THIEF:  THE PERCY JACKSON MUSICAL, which is finishing its four-performance sold out run at the Helen Theatre, is a co-production of Baldwin Wallace University’s nationally recognized Musical Theatre program and Playhouse Square.  It is the fifteenth collaboration between these two organizations. 
 
The musical, with words and lyrics by Rob Rokicki and book by Joe Tracz, is based on the first book in the multi-edition Perry Jackson series.  
 
It is in the fantasy genre that is parallel to THE HARRY POTTER books, aimed mainly at tween and teen readers, but also attracting older book buyers.  The series has been praised as an “irreverent introduction to Greek mythology” that might persuade some kids to dig deeper into the subject. 

THE LIGHTNING THIEF: THE PERCY JACKSON MUSICAL received positive reviews from critics in its original off-Broadway run, capped off by a critique which called it "worthy of the gods."  The national tour was also generally praised.  

Unfortunately, the Broadway version opened to widely negative reviews, capped-off by The New York Timestheater critic who wrote, “"it is both overblown and underproduced, filled with sentiments it can't support and effects it can't pull off."  He went on to say, the show has "all the charm of a tension headache."

What’s the show about and how effective is the BWU/PHSquare production?

“The musical follows Percy Jackson, a teenager who newly discovers that he is a demigod and goes on an epic quest, with two of his friends, to find Zeus's missing lightning bolt and prevent a war between the Greek gods.”
At the start of the epic tale, we find Percy Jackson, a 12-year-old boy with ADHD and dyslexia, on a field trip to the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. “While there, his substitute pre-algebra teacher, Mrs. Dodds, asks to speak with him. Once alone, Mrs. Dodds transforms into a Fury, a mythological Greek demon of Hades. Thanks to a pen that transforms into a sword named Riptide, thrown to Percy by his Latin teacher, Mr. Brunner, Percy manages to fend off and vaporize Mrs. Dodds.” 

After this incident, Percy is expelled from his school due to him failing to stay with the group. 

Sally, his mother, assures Percy the quirks and abnormalities of a person is what makes them special.  She takes Percy to the beach where she met the boy’s father, and the two run into Percy’s friend, Grover. Grover turns out to actually be a satyr, a Greek goat-like protector.

And thus, we are swept on a fantasy world of Greek gods, talking squirrels, mythological creatures, friendships and a quest of discovery.

The local production is directed by Aurora’s Chris McCarrell, who graduated from University School and Baldwin Wallace University. He portrayed Marius in the Broadway revival of LES MISÉRABLES, appeared in the television version of PETER PAN, and originated the titular character in THE LIGHTNING THIEF in its Off-Broadway premiere, 2019 tour, and Broadway production.

McCarrell’s connection to the script has been a part of his life since 2016 when the play started its journey to off-Broadway.  As McCarrell states, “The original production directed by Stephen Bracket dived into its scrappiness, its heart and its unhinged humor in a way that opened my eyes to a strikingly new fearless way to create theatre.”  He has taken that theory in directing the show, reinventing the staging, with the help of the students, for the BW/PhSquare production.

The staging works on many levels, falters on others.  

McCarrell and his talented cast have a major challenge at the outset.  The Helen, the Allen’s small black box space, is only about 10 rows deep, making all the action up-close and personal.  That works well for intimate plays and comedies, but not so much for a show that needs special effects and schticks and gimmicks to portray magic and fantasy.  

There are no facilities for electronic images and no fly areas and wing space or trap doors for set pieces and special effects to appear and disappear.  There is no curtain to close to hide set changes.  In other words, the opportunity for the needed “magic” effects is limited.  Only so much can be done with paper masks, fog and light changes.

As a pre-tween young man sitting behind me loudly whispered about half way during the production, “When is this going to be fun like the movie?”  
In spite of some excellent performances and attempts at directorial creativity, in spite of biased screams and applause of the many BW students in attendance at opening night, the show is missing the “wow.”

Danny Bó, he of cherubic face and soulful eyes, has the needed cuteness factor for portraying the multi-challenged Percy.  He has a nice singing voice and stage presence.  Jonah Warhaft (Grover) and Audrey Zahn (Annabeth) the other member of the trio on which the story hinges, did a nice job of developing the characters.  

Too bad the decision was made to mic the cast.  Some of the lines were lost, for even those of us in the front row, because the actors, assuming the mics would pick up their conversational-level projection, could not be heard.  It would have been good training for the cast to learn to project to the last row of the theater.

The rest of the Menace Cast (the show was double cast with the other group titled the Garage Cast) included Kechante Baker, Mark Doyle, Will Boone, Sydney Whittenburg, Dario Alvarez and Avery Elledge, all developed their multi-roles with proficiency.

McCarrell closed his director’s note in the program with the message, “I hope all leave this theatre ready to take on your own monsters, whatever they may be.  Next to your best friends, and your own pens that will never let you down when you need them most as swords.  Stumble on my friends.”  Nice thoughts!  

Capsule judgment:   Though the BW/PhSquare staging needs more schticks and awe to make it into the fantasy the story required, it gave the student performers a chance to do a different kind of musical and the audience a chance to get outside of their normal space and wander into an epic quest.  Guess the kid behind me was right, however, when he said, “When is this going to be fun like the movie?” 
 
Upcoming BW Musical Theatre presentations:  

Sondheim Celebration:  April 25 7 PM, Juniors present songs by the man who reinvented the American Musical, Black Box Theater at Beaumont School, 3301 N. Park Blvd, Cleveland Heights

Freshman showcase:  May 1, 2 PM, Mainstage Kleist Center for Art & Drama

Sondheim Celebration:  May 1, 7 PM, Juniors present songs by the man who reinvented the American Musical

Senior Showcase:  May 6, 6:30 and 8:30, A reenactment of the nonstop theatrical production to showcase each student in front of more than 200 Broadway casting directors and agents who have the power to put them on stage in regional touring productions, cruise ships, television shows and movies.

BWU/Square’s “Tick, Tick…Boom! Rocks and Delights at The Helen

The story of Jonathan Larson’s death before the first scheduled preview of the off-Broadway performance of his “Rent” has become theater history.  

Many assume, incorrectly, that “Rent” was Larson’s only contribution to the lexicon of American musical theater.

Before he composed his most popular work, Larson penned several other pieces, including “tick, tick… Boom,” which is basically personally biographical as well as an homage to theater legend Stephen Sondheim.  The script includes the song, “Sunday,” a tribute to Sondheim.

Larson idolized Sondheim, who professionally aided Larson by writing letters of support praising the young man’s work to various producers.  Not surprising, Larson was awarded the Stephen Sondheim Award.

“tick, tick… Boom” tells the tale of an aspiring composer named Jonathan who lives in NY in the 1990s.   It relates in spoken lines and songs the frustration he endures as he writes and has showcases for various musicals, with little success. 

The piece was originally a solo work which Larson performed.  After his death, playwright David Auburn re-wrote it as a three-actor piece.  It is this work that had four performances in The Helen, one of the black box performing spaces in the Allen complex at PlayhouseSquare.

The show has fourteen pop/rock songs and ballads and ironically predicts that Jon is about to write a “hit.” show.

As the lights come up a persistent ticking sound illustrates Jon’s mounting anxiety of having nothing to show for his soon to be 30 years on earth.  From that point, to the ending, when a message from Sondheim inspires Jonathan to play “Happy Birthday to me,” the small slice-of-life-show works well.

The BWU Musical Theatre program’s production was staged with two alternating casts, and an understudy cast (Andrew Nelin, Claire Soulier, Gordia Hayes).  The Saturday matinee and Sunday evening productions featured Alec Irion as Jonathan, Addie Morales as Susan and Matthew Harris as Michael and will be commented on in this review.  The other performances featured Charlie Ray (Jonathan), Nadina Hassan (Susan) and James T. Frazier (Michael).

The “Susan Cast” was excellent.  They exhibited strong voices, great enthusiasm and consistent awareness of their roles and the mood of the piece.
 

Alec Irion displayed a nice sense of comic timing, modulated well between being charming and fear-struck, sang well and competently played the piano.  His “30/90 Reprise” was a vocal highlight.

Irion, a rising senior, just returned from New York, where he and his classmates, presented their talent showcases.  Alec, as well as all others, received agent offers and many are or will soon be going to try to ply their craft on Broadway.

Another BWU soon-to-be-graduated senior is the very talented Matthew Harris.  His portrayal of Michael, Jonathan’s life-long friend and former roommate, showed why he has already had interest from Broadway casting directors.  “No More,” sung as a duet with Irion, was beautifully interpreted.

Undergrad, Nadine Hassan, who was one of the Maria’s in last year’s outstanding BWU’s production of “West Side Story,” displayed a nice stage presence in her portrayal of Susan, Jonathan’s girlfriend.  

Victoria Bussert’s direction was bulls-eye on target.  Musical director Beth Burrier and her band (Brent Hamker, Blake Kniola, and Jesse Penfound) rocked.  Gregory Daniels’ movement/choreography rolled. And the entire production was a “dope!”

Capsule judgment: “tick, tick… Boom” gives a focused picture of Jonathan Larson, who created the seminal musical, “Rent” which carried the art form into the twenty-first century.  It’s a shame that the production only ran for one weekend.  It could easily have developed a cult following and run for a long, long time.

“Lizzie,” the grizzly musical, rocks the Ohio

“On a sweltering summer morning in 1892, in a small New England city, a prominent businessman and his wife were brutally axed to death in their home. Their daughter, Lizzie Borden, was the prime suspect. Lizzie’s trial was a coast-to-coast media sensation, and her story has become an American legend.

Yes, that’s the Lizzie of the poem: “Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother forty-whacks.  When she saw what she had done, gave her father forty-one.”

The grizzly tale just finished a run on stage in the Ohio Theatre courtesy of Baldwin Wallace College’s Musical Theater Program in coordination with Playhouse Square.  Interestingly, this not the first go-around for the duo’s production of the script.  In 2012 the same team worked together to sell out the now shuttered 12th Street Theatre.

“Lizzie” is a rage, sex, betrayal, and bloody murder, set to a blistering score presented by four women fronting a six-piece band.

Rock tunes which scream lesbian heat and incest, interspersed with grisly humor make up the score with such heavy metal tunes as “Forty Whacks,” “This is not Love,” “Why are all these Heads Off,” “What the Fuck now, Lizzie,” “Will You Lie?” and “Into Your Wildest Dreams.”

“Lizzie” began life in 1990 as a four-song experimental theater/rock show created by writer/director Tim Maner and songwriter Steven Cheslik-DeMeyer. 

A few years later, they wrote six new songs.  After several more years of tinkering, 2012 brought the co-production by Baldwin-Wallace College and Cleveland’s PlayhouseSquare (directed by Victoria Bussert).

Most recently, earlier this year, Bussert directed a production in Denmark (in Danish) and in the UK (in English).

The present version is being staged with two casts, each staring for two performances.  The Friday and late Saturday productions featured the “Blood” cast and will be commented on in this review.  The other stagings featured the “Axe” cast (Olivia Kaufman, Emily Brett, Kelsey Baehrens and Amy Keum).

As evidenced by the enthusiastic Ohio Theatre audience, the show, which is as much a rock concert as musical theater, has strong appeal to the Millennials, those born from 1990 until 2000 and the 2K’s, those born after 2000.  They were on their feet screaming and stomping after many of the songs, often imitating the hair-whipping, body angled, hand gesturing stylized movements of the cast members.  The elders in attendance didn’t seem to be “with it” in the same frenzied way.

The BW cast was excellent.  They exhibited strong voices, great enthusiasm and consistent awareness of their roles and the over-all mood of the piece.  However, for those who like to hear and understand the words to the songs being sung, the excessive screaming and high decibel music, along with the loud pounding beat of the band, there was frustration.  Many of the words were lost to the volume of both voices and the music. 

Kailey Boyle exhibited a powerful voice with a large range.  Her saucer eyes helped create the often manic mood swings of Lizzie.  Her rock persona, displayed in many of the songs, was captivating to watch.

Veronica Otim has an electric stage presence.  She also displayed a diva voice, but often her words, both spoken and sung, were unintelligible due to excessive yelling. 

Livvy Marcus was properly introverted as Alice Russell, Lizzie’s female lover. She displayed good vocal ability and nice song interpretation.

Emily Wronski has a nice sense of comic timing and was convincing as Bridget Sullivan.

Matthew Webb’s band rocked, Gregory Daniels’ choreography rolled, and the entire production was murderous!

Capsule judgment: “Lizzie,” the rock musical, based on the Lizzie Borden murder mystery, is as much rock concert as theatre, represents the movement in musicals to take on modern trends in music, e.g., rock and rap, and appeal to a younger, modish audience. 

This production was staged at the Ohio Theatre from April 28-30, 2017.