Critic's Choice: The Shows To See This Weekend

Shows are opening (Carolyn German unveils her latest, Go From Here, and Nashville Ballet revives Carmina Burana, both this weekend), shows are closing (your last chance to catch The Taffetas at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre before they go the way of The Plaids is this weekend) and The Miss Firecracker Contest is back onstage at Donelson's Larry Keeton Theatre for the second of three weekends. Obviously, the 2016 theater season continues to reveal itself at a breakneck pace, giving audiences a veritable buffet of offerings from which to choose.

And coming up next Tuesday night, the Tennessee Performing Arts Center welcomes the national touring coming of Mamma Mia!, the ABBA-inspired musical that's sure to have audiences dancing in the aisles - you just can't help it!

We're always ready to help you plan your weekend (and beyond...into the start of the new week) activities with BWW Nashville's Critics Choice, offering up a compendium of what's available, what we recommend you see, and - in the cases of show's we've seen already - snippets of our reviews to help you make up your mind!

And if you're one of those people who plans ahead (they do exist, I am assured by people in the know), you might take a look at our weekly compilation of all things theatrical to be found in Nashville's Theater Calendar: /nashville/article/Nashvilles-Theater-Calendar-41816-20160418

Nashville Ballet will conclude its 30th anniversary season with Carmina Burana, a collaboration of epic proportions, that will be performed at Tennessee Performing Arts Center's Andrew Jackson Hall, April 22-24. In addition to Carmina Burana, the seasond finale features the world premiere of Nashville Ballet artistic director and CEO Paul Vasterling's Layla & The Majnun.

Carmina Burana features 148 singers from The Nashville Symphony Chorus, 61 musicians from The Nashville Symphony, 25 choristers from the Nashville's Children's Choir and three guest vocalists, alongside 24 dancers from Nashville Ballet. Based on a collection of poems written by clergy and theology students in the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries, Carmina Burana examines love, fortune and the cycle of life.The ballet is set to the iconic music of German composer Carl Orff written in the 1930s. The opening piece, O Fortuna, has made its mark as one of the most recognizable pieces of music in the world. Its strong percussive elements, ancient lyrics and ominous tone make it a frequent choice for movie and television placements, video games and sports games. Fortuna is visually represented by the Wheel of Fortune in the ballet, a constant reminder of fate's fickle nature. Additionally, the original parchment material that the poems were written on inspired portions of former Nashville Ballet dancer Eric Harris' costume designs and Vasterling's choreography.

Carmina Burana will be complemented by the world premiere of Layla & The Majnun. With roots in fifth century Persia, Layla & The Majnun has become one of the most popular love stories of the Middle Eastern world (similar to Romeo & Juliet in the West). The ballet, which explores themes of unrequited love, devotion and spiritual enlightenment, is presented to original music by renowned American composer Richard Danielpour.

Tickets for Carmina Burana with Layla & The Majnun start at $28 and can be purchased in person at the TPAC box office in downtown Nashville, by phone at (615) 782-4040 or at www.nashvilleballet.com.

Imagine if Picasso and Einstein had actually met: That's the premise for comedian-turned-playwright Steve Martin's Picasso at the Lapin Agile, which opens this Friday, April 22, at Brentwood's Towne Centre Theatre.

Directed by Jonah M. Jackson, Picasso at the Lapin Agile is set in a Parisian bar at the beginning of the 20th century (1904 to be precise), the play imagines a comical encounter between Pablo Picasso (played by Daniel Morgan) and Albert Einstein (Will Miranne), both of whom are in their early twenties and fully aware of their amazing potential. In addition to the two historical figures, the play is also populated with an amusingly incontinent barfly, a gullible yet lovable bartender, a wise waitress, along with a few surprises that trounce in and out of the Lapin Agile. Jackson's cast includes Andrew Johnson, Phil Brady, Emily Eytchison, Gracie Smith, Randal Cooper, Christopher Jennings, Jacqueline Smoak and Bowd Beal.

Picasso at the Lapin Agile opens April 22 and runs through May 7. Tickets may be purchased online at www.townecentretheatre.tix.com, by email at tickets@townecentretheatre.com or by calling (615) 221-1174. Show time is at 8 p.m. for evening performances and 2:30 p.m. for Sundays. Doors open 30 minutes prior to curtain. Tickets are $16 for students, $18 for seniors 60 and over, and $20 for adults. Purchase a specially priced Thursday 4-pack of tickets online and get four tickets for only $60, a deal available online only. Group rates are also available.

Nashville's Theater Craft, Inc. presents two new shows this weekend - April 21-23: Go From Here: The Music & Lyrics of Carolyn German and Improv Binge Watch! featuring the Spontaneous Comedy Company. The shows will be presented at the iconic Darkhorse Theater.

Go From Here: The Music & Lyrics of Carolyn German will be presented on April 21 and 22 as part of Theater Craft's Workshop Series. The show features the talents of: Bonnie Keen, Connye Florance, Ginger Newman, Tonya Pewitt, Taylor Simon, Anastasia Teel and Robert Whorton. Go From Here is directed by German, and music directed by Megan Santi, who also accompanies the singers. Songs include a wide variety of styles and genres, such as the humorous ode to the challenging Nashville roadway system called "A Corner"; the charming and whimsical "Parallel Universe;" and the comedic tour de force "You Can Keep the Wings." This workshop production is part of Theater Craft's "Workshop Series," which focusing on honing new theater works for the stage by presenting them first as readings and then workshop productions.

The show starts at 8 p.m.; tickets are $10 and are available in advance on www.BrownPaperTickets.com, and at the door.

Improv Binge Watch! featuring the Spontaneous Comedy Company will be presented on April 23, at 8 p.m. Nashville's premiere improv comedy group is made up of 2012 First Night Honoree Jackie Welch-Schlicher, Frank Rains, 2013 First Night Honoree Carolyn German, and Josh Childs, with Kevin Madill on the keyboard.

The Spontaneous Comedy Company has been bringing instantaneous live performances to Nashville audiences since 1998. With combined professional experiences that run from Musical Theater to Jazz, from Feature Film to National Commercials, and include writing, directing, performing, film-making, composing, and some serious goofing-off, it is no surprise that SCC has such a dedicated following.

Tickets are $20, and available at www.Brownpapertickets.com, or at the door.

Nashville Shakespeare Festival will celebrate Shakespeare's birthday and the 400th anniversary of his death this Saturday, April 23, with the Bard's Birthday Bash at the Nashville Public Library Main Branch, located at 615 Church Street.

The free party is part of a global celebration marking the Shakespearean milestone and will take place in the library courtyard from 1 to 4 p.m. As part of the celebration, the Nashville Shakespeare Festival will also stage the seventh annual Biggest Balcony Scene Ever. Copies of the edited script will be available at the event and are available for download on the NSF website. During the reading, all of the Romeos will take their places in the library's main lobby, while all of the Juliets will stand above them on the mezzanine, or "balcony." Casual dress is fine but costumes are encouraged, as there will be prizes for categories that include Most Creative, Best Couple and Best Young Shakespearean.

Live music, which starts at 1:45 p.m., will include David Olney presenting a sneak preview of one of the original songs written for this summer's Shakespeare in the Park production of The Comedy of Errors. The winner from the English Speaking Union's first American "Singing Shakespeare" competition, Kate Pierson, will also perform.

Snacks, soft drinks and cupcakes will be available on a first come, first served basis. In case of rain, the birthday party will move inside to the conference center on the first floor. For more information, visit www.nashvilleshakes.org, or call (615) 255-2273.

Actors Bridge Ensemble's 20th anniversary season continues with the Nashville premiere of Meg Miroshnik's The Fairytale Lives of Russian Girls, directed by Leah Lowe and running through Saturday, April 23 at the Belmont Black Box Theater.

Once upon a time - in 2005 - a 20-year-old girl named Annie returned to her native Russia to brush up on the language and lose her American accent. Underneath a glamorous Post-Soviet Moscow studded with dangerously high heels, designer bags, and luxe fur coats, she discovers an Enchanted Motherland teeming with Evil Stepmothers, Wicked Witches, and Ravenous Bears. Annie must learn how to become the heroine of a story more mysterious and treacherous than any childhood fairytale: her own. This subversive story haunts the audience and carries a powerful message for young women living in a world where not everything ends up happily ever after.

For the Nashville premiere of The Fairytale Lives of Russian Girls, Actors Bridge brings together the talents of two university theater department chairs: Leah Lowe, chair of the Vanderbilt Theater Department directs, and scenic design is by Paul Gatrell, chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance at Belmont University and a 2010 First Night Honoree. ABE is professional theater in residence at Belmont.

Lowe's cast includes ABE ensemble members Rachel Agee and CJ Tucker and Belmont BFA performance majors Ashley Joye, Johnna McCarthy, Austin Williams and Madeline Marconi.

We loved the show! And here's a snippet of our review: "Playwright Meg Miroshnik's darkly comic The Fairy Tale Lives of Russian Girls is given a superb production by Nashville's Actors Bridge Ensemble - in their ninth annual collaboration with the Belmont University Department of Theatre and Dance - featuring a sextet of extraordinary actors who are having what appears to be the time of their lives under the direction of Leah Lowe, chair of the department of theater at Vanderbilt University.

"Delving into the deeply complex culture of Russian life and history - and the fanciful, yet somehow disturbing, tales that have inspired and informed Russian literature for centuries - Miroshnik's equally complex play offers an intriguing and entertaining treatise on that literature, brought to life with contemporary twists and turns that make the stories more accessible to modern theater-goers, while suggesting comparisons and contrasts of Russia in the 21st century with the ancient Tsarist era and the hardships of the Communist years of the last century.

"It all sounds very deep and dour - and perhaps daunting to the theater-goer just out for a few hours' transportive entertainment - but what Miroshnik's script delivers, and which Lowe and company present, is something far less dogmatic and heavy-handed. Rather, it's something far more creative that is certain to set imaginations soaring.

"In fact, Lowe's artful rendering of The Fairy Tales Lives of Russian Girls is richly told and captivatingly acted by her estimable ensemble of actors. With vibrant intensity, the six women immediately rivet the audience's attention to the imaginative tale delivered onstage. Armed with wit, warmth and a certain skewed sensibility, they present a work that might be described as frightening at moments, yet somehow they are able to create moments of almost unexpected lightheartedness that leaven the proceedings with laughter and a sense of whimsy."

General Admission tickets are $25 in advance; $30 at the door. To purchase tickets, go to www.actorsbridge.org/the-fairytale-live-of-russian-girls, or at the Belmont Curb Event Center Box Office.

Britt Byrd takes on the challenging role of Carnelle Scott - and Nashville photographer Jenny Petit Steiner has the pictures to prove it - in The Larry Keeton Theatre's production of Beth Henley's The Miss Firecracker Contest, running at the Donelson theater through April 30 - the first presentation of a non-musical at The Keeton in more than four years.

BroadwayWorld.com's Nashville senior contributing editor Jeffrey Ellis (that would be me, of course) - who in 2015 directed Picnic for Circle Players and The Last 5 Years for VWA Theatricals - helms the production of Henley's classic Southern Gothic script that is filled with laughter and pathos in what the director describes "a uniquely Southern take on modern manners and morals."

Byrd is joined in the cast by Katherine Morgan (Morticia in Circle Players' The Addams Family and co-host of this year's Midwinter's First Night) as Carnelle's cousin, Elain Rutledge, a Natchez socialite who won the Miss Firecracker title at the age of 17; Michael Adcock (who just completed a run as Huey in Arts Center of Cannon County's Memphis the Musical) as Elain's brother, the ne'er-do-well Delmount Williams, who "has a very checkered past"; and Amber Boyer, a longtime Keeton Theatre favorite, as Popeye Jackson, the delightfully daft seamstress who helps sew up Carnelle's beauty pageant dreams while nursing a crush on Delmount. Rebekah Stogner, who was in Picnic last season, plays pageant coordinator - and head Jaycette - Tessy Mahoney, while Kurt Jarvis (who garnered critical acclaim last season in ACT 1's Take Me Out) takes on the challenge of Mac Sam, the syphilitic carnie whose animal magnetism makes him all the more iconoclastic.

Since it would be tacky of me to review my own show (don't think I didn't try), here's something from my "official" director's note: "Come go with me on a sentimental journey back to 1974...to a hot and sticky, sultry and sweaty late June day in downstate Mississippi. We're heading to the town of Brookhaven where, for years, its citizens have looked forward to the 4th of July and the crowning of the county's exemplar of feminine beauty, class, grace and refinement: Miss Firecracker. Carnelle Scott has been hard at work in preparation for the pageant at the town's fairgrounds where annually the local Jaycees select the district's entry into the upcoming Miss Mississippi pageant held up in Vicksburg in just a couple of weeks.

"Sure, Carnelle is a bigger-than-life character (and isn't that what we all want for the aspiring beauty queens in plays about a Southern summer?) whose exploits are often too much for her small-town neighbors, and her cousins Elain Rutledge and Delmount Williams may be better suited to the Southern Gothic plays of Tennessee Williams...but Carnelle and company may be closer to the truth, more like the people we know and love, than Williams' high-strung dreamers. Carnelle, Elain, Delmount and their pal Popeye Jackson are high-strung, for certain, and they are definitely dreamers, but they are more accessible to today's audience members with their forthright demeanors, outspokenness and all the qualities with which we can all identify.

"The Miss Firecracker Contest is one of my favorite plays and I suspect after you see our stellar cast deliver the story onstage tonight that it will be one of your favorites henceforth. You'll fall as deeply in love with these characters as I have and they will remain in your hearts for years to come. They may be crazy, but like every Southern family before them, they proudly put their crazy kin out front on the porch instead of hiding them in the attic - because here in the South, we know who the really good stories are always about..."

Spend four fun-filled seasons with Arnold Lobel's beloved storybook characters in the Tony Award-nominated musical A Year With Frog and Toad, playing through May 15 at Nashville Children's Theatre (NCT). In Robert and Willie Reale's whimsical show, Frog and Toad wake from hibernation in the Spring, plant gardens, swim, rake leaves, eat cookies, go sledding, and learn life lessons along the way. The two best friends celebrate and rejoice in their differences that make them unique and special. The jazzy, upbeat score bubbles with melody and wit, making A Year With Frog and Toad a musical sure to entertain the whole family.

"I am delighted to be able to bring you this endearing tale of friendship, adventure, change, and growth," said Guest Director Shawn Knight. "A Year With Frog and Toad is inventive and exuberant, bringing a vaudeville style (and lots of make-believe) to the stage while maintaining the charming spirit of both Lobel's text and illustrations. This show may have been written for younger audiences, but the hummable score and memorable characters are sure to charm kids from ages 4 to 104."

A Year With Frog and Toad is based on the popular Frog and Toad books written and illustrated by Arnold Lobel. Adapted by brothers Robert Reale (music) and Willie Reale (books and lyrics), the musical was commissioned by Lobel's daughter, Adrianne Lobel. It was first produced in 2002 by the Children's Theatre Company, Minneapolis, and brought professional children's theatre to Broadway for the first time when it opened at the Cort Theatre in 2003. It received three Tony nominations (Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score).

Bobby Wyckoff and Patrick Waller head up Knight's cast as a worrywart Toad and a perky Frog. Waller was last seen on NCT's stage as Nick in The Cat in the Hat, while Wyckoff most recently had the role of Rev. Graetz in the critically acclaimed production of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Rona Carter, James Rudolph, and Amanda Card portray a host of colorful woodland creatures that Frog and Toad also call friends, including mischievous squirrels, chatty birds, a bossy turtle, and an extremely speedy mail-delivering snail.

Knight, who is a familiar face on the NCT stage, makes his NCT directorial debut with A Year With Frog and Toad. Music Direction is by Russell Davis; choreography by Pam Atha; scenic and lighting design by Scott Leathers; and costume design by Patricia Taber. Dan Brewer serves as production stage manager.

Continuing in Smyrna is Springhouse Theatre Company's Mark Twain Presents The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, running through April 24. Join master storyteller Mark Twain as he leads audiences into the world of his most famous character: Tom Sawyer.

Tom's adventures never fail to remind us of why great storytelling never grows old. There comes a time in every rightly-constructed boy's life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure. For a young rapscallion named Tom Sawyer, that time is the middle of April, and that someplace is Springhouse Theatre Company. STC welcomes master storyteller, Mark Twain, to its stage, along with some of his most endearing and enduring creations, Huckleberry Finn, the Widder Douglas, Aunt Polly, and of course Tom Sawyer, in the season's mainstage finale, Mark Twain Presents The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Adapted for the stage by middle Tennessee playwright, novelist and filmmaker, Mike Parker, this production allows Mark Twain, played by Jack Gilpin, to interact with both the audience and the characters to bring the story to life.

Up in Crossville, Lori Fischer and Don Chaffer's new musical, The Sparkley Clean Funeral Singers, continue its run through May 28, featuring an all-star Cumberland County Playhouse cast that includes Fischer, Weslie Webster, Britt Hancock and Bill Frey. It's all about country music stardom run amok in a fictionalized version of Ashland City, Tennessee.

The Sparkley Clean Funeral Singers centers around the Lashley Sisters, a country-singing duo whose star was on the rise (with hit tunes like "Big Boned Dreams, Tiny Tambourines") until the publicity surrounding an accident brought their careers to a screeching halt. It seems Lashley Lee Lashley (Weslie Webster) was driving the band's tour bus while under the influence. Now the girls are back in their hometown of Ashland City, where sister Junie (playwright Lori Fischer) has taken over the family business, The Sparkley Clean Dry Cleaners. She also takes care of her father Lyle (Bill Frey), who's been having trouble remembering things lately. With Lashley fresh out of rehab and Junie up to her elbows in laundry, a professional comeback for the Lashley Sisters seems unlikely. That is, until Pastor Phil (Britt Hancock) of the Third United Separated Harmony Church informs them that Bindy Moss, the church's Funeral Singer, has gone to her eternal rest and asks them to take over the job. Junie pens the unforgettable tune "Bindy, Take A Seat At The Banquet Table (Cause There's No Need For Food Drives In Heaven)" and together with a reluctant Lashley, starts the sisters on a new career path: performing personalized sendoffs for the dearly departed! Will Lashley be able to stay clean and sober? Will Junie be able to juggle her taking care of the business - and her father - while writing her unique funeral songs? And will the Lashley Sisters make it back to Nashville?

Here's our take on the show's opening night performance: "Lori Fischer's The Sparkley Clean Funeral Singers does what so many shows before it have attempted: To create a whole new world out of whole cloth and set it down amid the already existing world (in which we mere mortals ply our collective trade), peopled by characters who are easy to love or at least accessible enough to be engaging and fun to watch. Where Fischer's new musical - now onstage at Crossville's Cumberland County Playhouse - succeeds so impressively is in its refreshing storytelling structure that invites audiences into the fictionalized version of Ashland City, Tennessee, where people care deeply about their neighbors and are likely to sing the songs that prove their affection and are certain to make you guffaw (more than once even).

"Clearly, it's not a life-changing, genre-shattering new musical on a grand, worldwide scale, nor will it likely ever be a hit on the Broadway. Rather, The Sparkley Clean Funeral Singers retains its small-town charm while embracing its Tennessee roots with enough sentimentality to ensure healthy responses from audiences (and critics!) to do credit to the awesome work by the playwright and her songwriting partner Don Chaffer, who have crafted a story that is eminently accessible and enormously likable. The show is never mawkish, its histrionics are manageable on a human scale, and yet somehow it is larger than life in the way every musical should be in order to fit the theatrical mold set forth as far back as the days of Romberg, Friml and Herbert, Kern and Hammerstein, Rodgers and Hammerstein, and Hammerstein accompanied by a whole cadre of other collaborators."

Continuing at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre is the nostalgic - and aforementioned - musical The Taffetas, directed by Bradley Moore and starring Jaclyn Lisenby Brown, Audrey Johnson, Rae Robeson and Sydney Caroline Hooper. Call (615) 646-9977 for reservations.

We loved the show and you likely will as well: "There's nothing quite so entertaining - and nothing goes down more easily after a trip to the groaning board at Nashville's iconic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre - than a musical revue that is sure to whisk you away to yesterday. Not the day before today, necessarily, but 'yesterday' as in a sentimental journey back to a time when life was somehow more innocent and somehow less complicated than what we experience in the day-to-day of 2016.

"The early 1950s were the hey-day of the girl singer and the girl group in American pop music: Connie Francis, Patti Page, Teresa Brewer, Jo Stafford, Brenda Lee and Kaye Starr ruled the music charts, along with the McGuire Sisters, the Chordettes, the Fontane Sisters and all the other configurations of young women harmonizing beautifully and rather transcendently, imparting words of wisdom about boys and beauty while sharing their wholesome outlook the world with their fans.

"It's that complex, though deceptively simple, world of love and romance, dreams and ambitions, music and harmony that provides Rick Lewis' off-Broadway and regional theater hit, The Taffetas - now onstage as part of the golden anniversary season at Chaffin's Barn - with its nostalgic setting in which four young Nashville women sing and dance their hearts out in a winningly engaging production directed by the peripatetic Bradley Moore in collaboration with choreographer Shauna Smartt Hopkins.

"The result of Moore and Hopkins' latest collaboration is a heartfelt tribute, both to the era and to the superbly talented performers who helped to make memorable and melodic songs such as "Sincerely" and "Where The Boys Are" chart-topping hits. Lewis has assembled a greatest hits - a veritable hit parade, as it were - for his fictional quartet of sisters to perform in the exquisitely timed and terrifically assembled musical revue, in which the songs reign supreme with just enough patter between them to keep your attention focused on the four women onstage."