Sacramento Theatre Company associate producer Michael Laun shakes up the STC Cabaret format with some good surprises. SacPress community contributor writer/photographer Barry Wisdom has a great preview of the latest show. Changes included the type of theme. Many previous shows have centered around specific composers. “Make Em Laugh” which runs for a short four show run this weekend on the STC Cabaret Stage, is centered around the title subject. It is a collection of songs, many of which are very well known songs by extremely well known composers from timeless shows. Many of the songs are also from “who wrote that”? Great song, but “what show”? Never heard of it. And it all works well tog

On Friday, 13 January, Runaway Stage Productions began its 2012 season with the Broadway rendition of "The Wedding Singer," at the 24th Street Theater in downtown Sacramento. The adaptation of Adam Sandler's 1998 film tells of a romantic comedy set in the 80's where wedding singer, Robbie Hart attempts to win the heart of Julie who is to marry the wrong man. The musical adaptation is rife with dedications to the 80's: from style to pop-culture references as well as the dancing and the music to help illustrate the era for the audience. The production runs through February 5 with tickets available through Runaway Stage Productions, contact: (916) 207-1226 or go to www.runawaystage.com for

The latest Broadway Sacramento show “Rain: A Tribute to The Beatles” opened to a nearly sold out house at the Sacramento Community Theater Tuesday evening. “Rain: A Tribute to The Beatles” opens with archival film of the Beatles’ first appearance on “The Ed Sullivan Show” projected on two large screens flanking the stage. As the curtain rises, the band breaks into a set of the earliest Beatles music. The audience breaks into screams. This is followed by a set of more early music timed to the Beatles’ Aug. 15, 1965, Shea Stadium concert. The two large screens, plus a much larger screen at the back of the stage, and some props and lighting effects set the scene very well. It is still inte

Travel back through time with Broadway Sacramento's Rain, a Beatles tribute show that began as an offshoot of the Broadway production of Beatlemania. Rain ran on Broadway for 300 shows and 8 preview performances at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre in New York City and has also been a hugely successful national tour for years. Together longer than the Beatles, Rain has mastered every song, gesture and nuance of the legendary foursome, delivering a totally live, note-for-note performance. This multi-media show begins by taking us away to a time when four young men stepped on stage at the Ed Sullivan show and changed music as we knew it. Rain chronicles the journey America took with the Beatles,

T & R Taste of Texas opened on Broadway near 36th Street in late October, and Chef Rodney Ray said he thinks the barbecue restaurant will be able to last in the spot that has seen several businesses come and go in past years. “It’s simple, good, home-cooked food,” he said Wednesday. “It’s great barbecue, and we don’t grill it – we smoke it.” All meats are smoked a minimum of five hours in an on-site smoker, and four types of wood are used: apple, hickory, mesquite and cherry, Ray said. Meats and other ingredients come from local restaurant suppliers, and he added that he wants to work with farmers markets to bring in local produce during harvest season. Ray, who is a longtime friend of

El Dorado Musical Theatre held auditions Monday night for the classic Broadway musical, "42nd Street". Set in 1933, "42nd Street" tells the story of a chorus girl, Peggy Sawyer, who gets the chance to become a leading lady after the fading diva, Dorothy Brock, is injured before opening night of her Broadway show. Fresh off their multiple Elly Award wins and their critically acclaimed production of "Disney's Beauty and the Beast", El Dorado Musical Theatre drew a crowd of 53 local actors and actress, all between the ages of 13 and 22. Don't let age fool you. El Dorado Musical Theatre is far from your run-of-the-mill youth theatre group. Many of the performers are seasoned professionals, w

Capital Stage’s move from the Delta King to the heart of Midtown, while a great deal of work, seems to have gone smoothly. The new theater certainly fulfills the part of Capital Stage’s mission about performing “in an intimate, close up setting.” Capital Stage chose “Superior Donuts” by Tracy Letts to open its seventh season. It is the first in a theater designed by them to produce the type of shows they like to do. Letts is now best known for “August: Osage County” a major Broadway hit bigger than life in every way. “Superior Donuts” tells the story of Arthur Przybyszewski a classic hippy from the 60s. Arthur now runs the rundown North Chicago donut shop inherited from his Polish emigra

New Helvetia Theatre ends its three-weekend run of Michael John Lachiusa’s off-Broadway show “Little Fish” this weekend. While Lachiusa is known for two Broadway shows, "Marie Christine" and "The Wild Party," he has written several smaller-scale off-Broadway shows. Most of these have a reputation of being very serious. “Little Fish” is one of his lighter works and was suggested from the short stories of Deborah Eisenburg.   “Little Fish” is New York City-centric. It is the setting of the play, and some of the interactions of the characters can be described as very “New York.” The play itself is part of a genre of musicals, many by Lachiusa, that are specifically written for off-Broadway w

Just before hitting the big time on Broadway, winning a Tony Award for best actress in a musical for her role as Adelaide in “Guys and Dolls” opposite Nathan Lane, Faith Prince made a major connection in Sacramento. Prince was appearing in “On a Clear Day” with Jack Jones at Music Circus. Little did she know that the man playing trumpet in the pit, Larry Lunetta, would become her husband and father of their son, Henry. Eventually, Prince and Lunetta decided that Sacramento would be the best place to raise their child and relocated here. Prince has continued to expand her performance world with more Broadway shows, notable roles include “The Bells are Ringing” and Ursula in “The Little M

Some Bingo players are notorious for not letting anything get in the way of their Bingo night. That is definitely the case of Vern, Patsy and Honey, the trio of women at the center of “Bingo the Winning Musical,” which opened this last weekend at the Cosmopolitan Cabaret. The show begins with our trio of bingo addicted ladies listening to emergency weather reports describing a major storm raging outside. No one should leave their home except in the most dire emergency, but does this faze our intrepid gang? Not in the least. Besides, this is not just any Bingo night. This is the anniversary of the local bingo parlor featuring a double prize! No little storm is going to keep our girls away

“Shrek the Musical” kicked off the Broadway Sacramento 2011-2012 season with a Technicolor extravaganza. Based on the characters and story of the book “Shrek!” by William Steig, DreamWorks adapted the book into its blockbuster hit animated movie ”Shrek” in 2001. With a cast of major film actors voicing the characters the movie became the first of a major film and product franchise. DreamWorks expanded that franchise into their first foray into live productions with the opening of “Shrek the Musical” on Broadway in December 2008. After a very successful run on Broadway “Shrek the Musical” went on a US national tour and a London West End production with continuing changes to the production

Big Idea Theatre’s production of “The Pillowman” opened Thursday night and led its viewers through a dark and sometimes painful statement about the importance of storytelling and art. The play, directed by Kirk Blackinton, is an adaptation of the 2005 Broadway hit by the same name. Set in a totalitarian police state, the dark play chronicles the interrogation of Katurian Katurian, a brilliant writer with a tortured past. He and his older brother, Michal, who suffers from a form of mental retardation, are being held on charge of the murder of several young children. The two cops, Tupolski and Ariel, are attempting to tie Katurian’s stories to the killings. Many of his stories portray grue

Sigmund Freud, the creator of psychoanalysis, held many controversial views and theories. His staunch atheism is one of the strongest and most controversial. The great English writer C. S. Lewis, best known for “The Chronicles of Narnia,” also a staunch atheist as a young man, embraced Christianity as a professor at Oxford. Much credit for his conversion is given to long conversations with “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings” author J. R. R. Tolkien. Award-winning playwright Mark St. Germain’s current off-Broadway hit “Freud’s Last Session” imagines a conversation between the two brilliant men very near the end of Freud’s life, while Lewis is a young Oxford professor and little-known

Sacramento, CA | Tim Mason, CEO of California based Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, with Mayor Kevin Johnson, Councilman Jay Schenirer and other community memberrs broke ground Wednesday morning in a well attended ceremony in Oak Park.  The market will be built on the north west corner of Broadway and 34th Street. Mayor Kevin Johnson stated that when he came back from college he said "what can we do with this piece of property? As a year or two went by, you realize that properites this size get into the wrong hands."  Johnson bought the land in 2002 and just held it "till the right person came in or the right company said 'we want to do something that will be an assest to the community.

Miss Saigon at the Music Circus The final offering in the Music Circus 2011 lineup is the international spectacular “Miss Saigon.” The stirring and visually stunning production is a solid reinterpretation of Giacomo Puccini’s opera “Madame Butterfly,” relocated to Vietnam on the eve of the fall of Saigon in April 1975. This is a modern retelling of unexpected love found in an unlikely way, of the tragic separation of lovers and the dreams that sustain them through adversity, and the uncontrollable twists of fate that bring them back together under even more tragic circumstances. Orphaned bar girl Kim (played by Ma-Anne Dionisio) meets American G.I. Chris (Eric Kunze) at the Saigon bar

Everything, including the play, cast, choreography, direction, costuming and set design, comes together to produce a near-perfect show of “Annie Get Your Gun,” which opened at Music Circus Tuesday night. The original producers of “Annie Get Your Gun,” Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, no slouches at musical theater music and lyrics themselves, persuaded a reluctant Irving Berlin to write the music and lyrics for the show when Jerome Kern died suddenly. Berlin is considered to be the preeminent American songwriter, and he created some of his most popular music for “Annie Get Your Gun.” It has song after song that became popular hits, including the opening song, “There’s No Busines

Sacramento’s brewing history will be spotlighted in a new microbrewery set to open in a historic building on Broadway early next year. Dave Gull, 37, said he saw the building at 1730 Broadway and thought it would be the perfect place for his New Helvetia Brewing Company idea with its proximity to Land Park in an area that’s a diverse mix of ethnic restaurants. Though his professional experience is as a real estate broker and developer, the Sacramento native said his exposure to craft brews when he went to college at the University of Oregon planted the seed to open his own brewery. “I think that a craft beer brewery is a great use for the space,” Gull said Friday. “It’s a need that is l

Music Circus opened its third show of the season, “Anything Goes,” Tuesday evening to much audience approval. Clearly the stars of the show were the songs of one of America’s most beloved composers, Cole Porter. “Anything Goes” has numerous songs that are included in what is known as The Great American Song Book. This includes "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick Out of You," "It's De-Lovely" and the title song “Anything Goes.” Several other songs in the show are also well known, and the rest are above average. Along with all the great music, there is a fun plot with book by English writer P.G. Woodhouse (“Jeeves and Wooster”) and his theatrical collaborator, Guy Bolton. Most of the action ta

The Music Circus is a Sacramento treasure. Few seem to realize how rare a gem it is. Turning out seven productions that run for five days each that are of the unbelievably high production value is a truly amazing feat. The term “summer stock” does not really do justice to what California Musical Theatre produces under the tent. I see a lot of musical theater, including, most recently, the hottest show on Broadway, “The Book of Mormon.” The entertainment quality and value that CMT creates week after week equals and sometimes exceeds that of Broadway and Broadway touring shows. How do they do it? First it is the venue. The state-of-the-art Wells Fargo Pavilion seats over 2,000 people but

Is there a difference in how men and women communicate? Do they, in fact, view the world differently? Rob Becker’s comedic play “Defending the Caveman” demonstrates not only that this is true, but that this can be traced all the way back to when Homo sapiens lived in caves. Now don’t confuse “Defending the Caveman” with some academic lecture. The show is much more akin to stand-up comedy — stand-up comedy with a nice set design, sound track and introduction video. Speaking of the set, it looks like Fred and Wilma Flintstone meet HGTV. The Cosmopolitan Cabaret production of “Defending the Caveman” opened Thursday evening with Cody Lyman in the role of today’s caveman. Lyman is one of sev