New Burt Bacharach Musical in Thousand Oaks

Theater League presents the world premiere of Love Sweet Love, a new musical featuring 31 songs by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, celebrating the 50th anniversary of their legendary collaboration, and book by C. Ben Wolfe.  Sha Newman, who staged the Ovation Award-winning production West Side Story, directs and choreographs a cast of seventeen in this new musical starting Tuesday, December 4 at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza (2100 Thousand Oaks Blvd.) in Thousand Oaks.

"Bacharach-David's songs are the perfect vehicle for musical theater," explained Love Sweet Love bookwriter C. Ben Wolfe.   "Each Hal David lyric is a wonderful, self-contained story about love – whether lost, found, dreamed about or realized.  That's the sentiment that makes the Bacharach-David songbook so right for musical theater." 

Bacharach and David began collaborating in 1957 when they struck gold with hits for Marty Robbins and Perry Como.  The multiple Grammy, Academy, and Tony award-winning team went on to write and produce hits for numerous other performers, including Dionne Warwick,  the Fifth Dimension, Bobby Vinton, Herb Alpert, Tom Jones, Jack Jones, Dusty Springfield, and B.J. Thomas.  Bacharach and David collaborated on the Broadway musical Promises, Promises, and won the Academy Award for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

Love Sweet Love features 31 of Bacharach and David's greatest hits including:  "Always Something There to Remind Me," "Do You Know The Way to San Jose," "One Less Bell To Answer," "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head," "Say A Little Prayer," "The Look of Love," "Close to You," "Walk on By," What The World Needs Now" and "What's New Pussycat."  It tells the story of four contemporary Los Angeles women looking for love during the week leading up to Valentine's Day.

"These songs are about people we know, people we can relate to," continued Wolfe.  "And the feelings are as real and relevant now as they were in the 60's and 70's when Burt and Hal wrote their biggest hits.  That's why I set the production in present time.  These lyrics work now and always."

Love Sweet Love's four ladies looking for love are played by Kristen Howe (Broadway's Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat), Alaine Kashian (Broadway's Cats and The Times They Are Changin'), Dawnn Lewis (NBC's "A Different World" and Pasadena Playhouse's Sister Act) and Kara Shaw (The Marvelous Wondrettes).  The cast also features Keith Bearden, Matthew Patrick Davis, Daniel Lujan, Gail Bianchi, Jessica Dorman, Michael Dotson, Terry Hanrahan, Eugene Barry-Hill, Ron Kellum, Mercy Malick, Samantha Mills, George Pelligrino and Staci Wilson.

Joining the creative team with Newman are Lloyd Cooper, musical direction / orchestrations/ arrangements; Bradley Kaye, set design; Thomas G. Marquez, costume design; Stephen Young, lighting design; Mark Ciglar, video design and Mark Cowburn, sound design. 

Love Sweet Love will have its world premiere at the Mesa Arts Center in Mesa, Arizona on November 20, 2007.  The production will have its California premiere at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts (November 30 – December 2) prior to its opening at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza on December 4, 2007.

For more information, visit www.lovesweetlovethemusical.com.  Tickets for the Thousand Oaks production range from $40 - $49 and can be purchased through Ticketmaster.

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