Shady Lady 1933

BWW Reviewer Peter Nason chooses the best film musicals since the sound era began; see if your favorites made the list!

Need a pick-me-up from a bad day? Aching to smile heartily through a pleasantly peppy stage musical? Then you need not look further than the rousing, just-launched new touring production of the Tony Award-winning hit 42ND STREET, now currently entertaining audiences at Orange County's Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa through November 22. Earnestly cheerful and unabashedly optimistic, this feel-good, all-singing, all-dancing 1980 stage adaptation of Busby Berkeley's classic 1933 movie musical is back on the road in a brand new, non-Equity national tour directed by co-writer Mark Bramble, who earned a Tony nomination for directing the Tony-winning 2001 Broadway revival. Aside from its Broadway-caliber creative aspects, this new tour succeeds tremendously thanks to its young, energetic, and incredibly likable ensemble cast that brings vim and vigor to the aging Great-Great-Grand-Daddy of all backstage musicals.