Review: SONGS FOR A NEW WORLD Brightens Servant Stage

When Jason Robert Brown gave the stage SONGS FOR A NEW WORLD, he called it a collection of songs about making decisions, though some suggested he was just trying to find a place for good songs that don't really fit in his other musicals. Does it really matter? Of course not. They're good songs, a few even great ones, that, when performed by an ensemble of top.Servant Stage singers, can hold an audience spellbound.

Wally Calderon, the director, as well as his ensemble, are clearly having the time of their lives with the show, and that energy surrounds the audience as the performers tackle material from a ship's officer's prayer ("On the Deck of a Spanish Sailing Ship, 1492"), to Betsy Ross's musings on completing the sewing of the first United States flag ("The Flagmaker, 1776"). Between historical musings, there are much lighter moments, not so much of decision, but of powerful.emotion. "Just One Step" hysterically tells of a rich, bored Manhattan wife's threats to jump from the penthouse balcony, belted to a husband who isn't paying the slightest attention to her !atest tirade, while "Surabya-Santa" features a slinky Russian (or not) Mrs. Santa expressing her extreme discontent with Santa and his schedule. But then again, there's "Stars and the Moon," a rueful contemplating of how all the right life choices turn out to be wrong.

The songs cover the highs and lows of emotion and existence, performed by such local favorite performers as Brittany Adair Beitzel, Asia Littlejohn, and Joshua William Green. The band is on stage with them, as improvised sets move around the stage with the action. There's no standing still to be found here.

This is one more example of Servant Stage's philosophy paying off. Pay-what-you-will theatre can be completely professional as well as affordable, and can reach and hold audiences who want quality productions. Servant Stage also proves every season that "family friendly" never has to have a lowering of theatrical standards or be aimed specifically to children. In a day when dinner and a movie costs a small fortune, it's a privilege to be able to afford to take your family to.professional live theatre and still be able to pay the bills. SONGS FOR A NEW WORLD is at Junction Center, Manheim through the 27th, and will be followed in June by a full-scale production of the Broadway hit NEWSIES.