Jeffrey Ellis - Page 132

First created by writer William March in his 1954 book The Bad Seed, then recreated by playwright Maxwell Anderson for his hugely successful Broadway play of the same name (which was filmed for the screen by Mervyn LeRoy, starring the Broadway duo of Patty McCormick and Nancy Kelly as Rhoda and her mother), the character of Rhoda Penmark has inspired (Tina Denmark in the musical Ruthless is clearly a doppelganger for Rhoda) and sent chills up the spines of audiences for more than 50 years - and now Nashville's Street Theatre Company plans a revival - with a contemporary twist - of the melodrama for presentation in June.

FIVE features the talents of Erin Parker, Melodie Madden Adams, Megan Murphy Chambers, Cori Laemmel and Laura Matula. Born as the brainchild of Parker, FIVE is the culmination of her desire to showcase local Nashville talent and creativity and grew from her aims at putting on her own one-woman show.

First-time director Anne-Geri Fann acquits herself admirably with her production of Tennessee Williams' The Night of the Iguana which, like so many of Williams' characters, is flawed and imperfect yet somehow compelling, provocative and imminently watchable. With a stunning triad of Nashville actors taking on the leading characters in the play - Cinda McCain, Jack Chambers and Robyn Berg - your rapt attention to the stage proceedings is demanded and the three never disappoint, delivering performances that are stunningly raw yet somehow refined, callous yet heartfelt.

Laura Matula is amazing, talented, fascinating, intriguing - and so much more. Seriously, there are so many words to describe her that you find yourself stymied by the multi-layered and multi-dimensional being that is she. That is until the celebrity biographers come a-calling or the producers start planning the film treatment of her astounding and compelling life story.

The Renaissance Center in Dickson presents a unique production of Annie, Jr., a Broadway Junior version of one of the most beloved musicals of all time, running March 11-20. The Young Entertainers on Stage (Y.E.S.) production is adapted for young performers and is cast entirely with kids from first through 12th grades. The seven-time Tony Award winning musical boasts a hit score that includes 'It's A Hard Knock Life,' 'You're Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile,' 'Easy Street' and the song used to cheer up children of all generations, 'Tomorrow.'

Clint Jefferies' The Three Musketeers, a musical retelling of the classic Alexandre Dumas tale of the young D'Artagnan, who leaves home to seek for adventure and glory in Paris with the King's Musketeers, will be presented by Donelson's Larry Keeton Theatre, March 11-27.

Cinda McCain may have been born with the express purpose of bringing Tennessee Williams' wounded yet fiery Southern heroines to life. Unique among Nashville actresses, she's played Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie and Flora in 27 Wagons Full of Cotton - and now she is playing Maxine Fault in ACT 1's production of The Night of the Iguana at Nashville's Darkhorse Theater.

George W. Manus Jr. directs Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman to mark the first anniversary of his Murfreesboro-based theater company, Out Front on Main Inc. Running, March 17-April 3, The Pillowman is performed Thursday through Sunday evenings at 7:30 p.m.

Civil War Voices, a new musical by James R. Harris and Mark Hayes, currently in production at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia, will be the featured theatrical event during South Carolina's Civil War Sesquicentennial Commemoration in Charleston, April 8-12. Seven performances of the musical will be staged at Charleston's Memminger Auditorium.

Remind me someday to tell you my Connie Francis story - although, in retrospect, it probably veers dangerously close to the realm of 'you had to be there,' but then again, who among you has a Connie Francis story to tell? The Italian-American songstress, who was such a presence in American pop culture in the middle of the last century, has been on my mind a lot since seeing Breaking Up is Hard to Do, an appealing, if slight, musical revue featuring the hits of Neil Sedaka, now onstage at The Gaslight Dinner Theatre at The Renaissance Center in Dickson.

Old-fashioned and sweetly sentimental, The Silver Whistle is a gentle theatrical comedy about a group of downtrodden senior citizens during the Great Depression who are yearning to find something to lift them out of their own collective doldrums and allow them to once again be vital, productive human beings. Luckily, for this particular group of seniors - all of whom live in the 'old people's home' of the Church of John in some unnamed American city - their ho-hum existence is upended by the unexpected arrival of Oliver T. Erwenter, a fast-talking, silver-tongued huckster, who may have discovered the Fountain of Youth.

Tonya Pewitt stars as plus-size heroine Tracy Turnblad - with Michael Holder as Link - who has a passion for dancing, and wins a spot on the local TV dance program, in the musical comedy Hairspray, next up at Nashville's Street Theatre Company, March 25-April 16.

Jennifer Drake is one of the leading lights of the relatively young - and Nashville-based - Dance Theatre of Tennessee, taking on major roles for the company throughout its short history. Most recently, she was featured in the company's midwinter repertory Aspects of Love, performed at The Harpeth Hall School.

Everyone warned me: from the very first person who heard I would be seeing Tuesdays With Morrie at Cumberland County Playhouse to the stage manager I saw in the lobby just before heading into the Adventure Theatre where Daniel Black and John Fionte hold sway as sportswriter Mitch Albom and his mentor Morrie Schwartz in Albom's sharp and sentimental play, directed by Nicole Begue. They all warned me.

Camp Rock, The Musical could easily be dismissed as so much homogenized, Disneyfied, teenaged pablum - but, in reality, it's much more than that. It's a fast-moving, engaging love story set to music and is much more akin to all those Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney 'let's put on a show!' movies than you might expect.

Nashville favorite Tyson Laemmel stars as Robbie, 'a cheesy, but lovable New Jersey rocker' in Circle Players' upcoming production of The Wedding Singer, the upbeat romantic musical comedy that debuted on Broadway in 2006 and is based on the 1998 Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore movie. Starring opposite Laemmel is Laura Thomas Sonn as 'a hopelessly romantic waitress.'

Belles on Their Toes, the sequel to the classic stage comedy Cheaper by the Dozen, opens the 2011 season at Lakewood Theatre Company in Old Hickory, running February 18-March 5. Curtain time is 7:30 p.m. for Friday and Saturday performances, with 2:30 matinees slated for Sunday, February 20 and 27.

Before she returns to Broadway in a much-anticipated revival next year, Annie - America's best-known comic strip orphan turned musical comedy heroine - makes a stop in Franklin as the beloved musical that's 'all about her' hits the stage at Bethlehem United Methodist Church, March 4-13.

Born in Texas, but a Nashvillian through-and-through, Jake Speck might look like your stereotypical matinee idol - tall and good-looking - but there's a certain affable goofiness about him that completely blows the stereotype out of the water. You can't help but like the guy! Add to that immense likability factor a whole bunch of talent and you have a very formidable force of nature in the person of Jake Speck.

The Renaissance Center in Dickson presents a unique production of Annie, Jr., a Broadway Junior version of one of the most beloved musicals of all time, running March 11-20. The Young Entertainers on Stage (Y.E.S.) production is adapted for young performers and is cast entirely with kids from first through 12th grades. The seven-time Tony Award winning musical boasts a hit score that includes 'It's A Hard Knock Life,' 'You're Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile,' 'Easy Street' and the song used to cheer up children of all generations, 'Tomorrow.'