The Hunchback of Notre Dame at The Center for the Arts

Based on the Victor Hugo novel and songs from the Disney animated feature, The Hunchback of Notre Dame showcases the films Academy Award-nominated score, as well as new songs by Menken and Schwartz. Peter Parnells new book embraces story theatre and features verbatim passages from Hugos gothic novel.The musical begins as the bells of Notre Dame sound through the famed cathedral in fifteenth-century Paris. Quasimodo, the deformed bell-ringer who longs to be "Out There," observes all of Paris reveling in the Feast of Fools. Held captive by his devious caretaker, the archdeacon Dom Claude Frollo, he escapes for the day and joins the boisterous crowd, only to be treated cruelly by all but the beautiful gypsy, Esmeralda. Quasimodo isnt the only one captivated by her free spirit, though the handsome Captain Phoebus and Frollo are equally enthralled. As the three vie for her attention, Frollo embarks on a mission to destroy the gypsies and its up to Quasimodo to save them all.