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Live Arts hosts ‘world’s fastest’ fest

"I knew I could stay up,” said Denise Stewart, a playwright who’ll be featured in 24/7: The World’s Fastest Theater Festival. “I have insomnia, so I just didn’t take my Ambien.”

Blink and you’ll miss it! Live Arts presents 24/7 Saturday, January 28 at 7:30pm and 10pm. (Photo by Martyn Kyle)

Stewart has participated in the event, which condenses the process of staging a play to 24 hours, for the past three years. On January 27, seven playwrights will gather at the DownStage at Live Arts, receive an audience-generated theme, and hammer out a 10-minute play that will be performed the following night. It’s an absurd idea considering it usually takes years for a play to move from conception to production, but it makes for good, um, theater.

“It reverses the paradigm of typical theater programming. Usually, there is a lot of thought put into the process. 24/7 offers the opportunity to get that adrenaline rush of making quick decisions,” said Ray Nedzel, founder of Whole Theatre and organizer of the 24/7 project. Nedzel has performed in similarly time-constrained theater events in New York, Seattle, and Los Angeles and felt that the theater community in Charlottesville could also feel the need for speed. He was right. 24/7 has sold out each year it’s run, and as Nedzel said, it “opens the world of theater to people who may only have one day they can commit to the process.” 

One of those participants this year is Dannika Lewis, nightside reporter for local NBC affiliate Channel 29. Her job obligations preclude her from the time commitments required in regular theater productions, so she is excited about walking the boards during 24/7.  

“I actually covered it last year for work and fell in love with the event,” she said. “The whole 24-hour thing is utterly insane. It should be a wild ride.” 

Here’s how the festival works. On Friday night, after the theme is decided [last year’s was “Jobs, Jobs, Jobs”], the audience submits suggestions for a key phrase that must be incorporated into the script. Then the playwrights draw a character breakdown out of a hat—i.e. two men, one woman—at which point they have 11 hours to write a play. Once the playwrights are gone, the directors and designers meet to tour the performance space, check all the electronic equipment, and set the basic stage lighting. 

Saturday’s action is as follows:

7:30am: Sleep-deprived playwrights turn in their work. Directors are randomly assigned a play and actors. Then it’s off to a designated rehearsal space to get cracking. Local businesses—like Speak! Language Center, Light House Studio, Marty Moore Photography, the Omni, and Mudhouse—have supported 24/7 by donating rehearsal space in past years.

9:30am to 2:30pm: Mayhem ensues as seven plays rotate production meetings and rehearsals while the crew scrambles to build set pieces, collect costumes and props, and hang additional lights. The playwrights, who are rendered fairly useless at this point, are sent home to catch some much-needed sleep.

2:30 to 6pm: Each play gets a three-pronged technical rehearsal involving setting cues for lighting and sound, a cue to cue (which is basically practice for the technical people), then a full run through. In snail (read: normal) theater, this process takes weeks, but in 24/7 each play gets 25 minutes.

6pm: The order of the plays is set and the actors scramble to memorize their lines.

7:30pm: Showtime! Once an actor is finished on stage, he or she is allowed to go to the gallery for the remaining shows. 

10pm: The plays are staged in reverse order.

Nedzel said 24/7 is not just about getting something on stage in a limited timeframe.

“The goal is to do something damn good in 24 hours.” 

In 2009, playwright Jennifer Hoyt Tidwell created Chapter 11: Indians in the House, in which middle-aged male twins struggled with one twin’s delusion that he was Laura Ingalls Wilder in Little House on the Prairie. Live Arts was so impressed with the quality of the piece that it was performed at the annual Gala as a showcase. There’s a rule that more than half of the people in each category (playwright, director, actor) must be new to the project. “We want to keep it fresh and challenging,” says Nedzel. “It is best if it represents what the community of artists can do.”     

By the end of 24/7 2012, the festival will have created 28 new plays, featuring the talents of 23 playwrights, 24 directors, and 73 actors. But let’s face it, the real draw is to witness what creative people can do under pressure. As Lewis said, “It’s live theater, anything could happen.” And it probably will.

24/7: The World’s Fastest Theater Festival starts Friday January 27 at 7:30pm at Live Arts and continues with performances on Saturday, January 28 at 7:30pm and 10pm. Admission for the kickoff on Friday night is free. Saturday shows are $10. For tickets contact Live Arts at www.livearts.org or call the box office at 977-4177. For more information go to wholetheatre.org.

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Much Ado opens Renaissance Season at Blackfriars

Watching the audience is one of my favorite parts of the experience at the Blackfriars Playhouse in Staunton. Unlike with most Shakespeare companies, the crowd is normally eclectic, representing a range of ages, ethnicities, and fashion sensibilities. The packed house on opening night of Much Ado About Nothing—the first of five shows that make up the company’s famed Actor’s Renaissance Season for 2012—was no exception, and the place simply buzzed with anticipation.

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING plays on select dates at the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton through April 6.  For more information visit ASC online or call 877-682-4236.

The “Ren” season, as it is lovingly called by regulars, is particularly fun for theatergoers, because it offers a taste of the shear madness that was common in Shakespeare’s time. Plays are produced with no special lighting, no sets, and no electronic sound (which is standard practice for American Shakespeare Center productions), but the ‘Ren’ season shows have no director, no costume designer, and entail only two days of rehearsal time before their opening nights. Much Ado is glorious, hilarious, magical mayhem, and the audience gobbled it up like a favorite dessert, rewarding the actors with six curtain-less curtain calls and a standing ovation.

Miriam Donald played a feisty, somewhat snarky, Beatrice as a foil to Benjamin Curns’ puffed up, overly emotional Benedick, making an irresistibly dynamic pair as the couple warred with words before being tricked into love. One audience member laughed knee-slapping hard during the scene where Benedick complained about Beatrice as she, unknown to him, stood directly behind him. In that scene Donald was so physically strong and present and Curns so perfectly comic in his expressions and movements that the contrast was like sea salt sprinkled on caramel.

Taken as a whole, the show was clever—the text so expertly delivered, the acting so attuned to the audience that it was almost as much fun to watch the audience reactions as it was to watch the actors. Two young boys seated to the left of the stage were rapt the entire show and almost fell out of their chairs laughing along with the rest of the audience as Benedick dove over a rail into a seating aisle as he eavesdropped on a conversation about himself.

Brandi Rhome played the ingenue, Hero, with the regal bearing of a young Michelle Obama. Aiden O’Reilly, as the evil Don Jon, practically slithered on the stage in his Johnny Cash black suit and rock star shades. He made a cool, hip villain and somehow broadened a character who often comes across as one-dimensional because he has so few lines. John Harrell gave the verbally-challenged Dogberry such an authoritative air that the irony of his insisting “I am an ass,” was doubly funny.

The only difficulty I found with the production was the distraction caused by Donald’s obvious pregnancy. With such a glaring baby bump on Beatrice, how to explain Benedick’s worship of her, when the play itself is a game about the purity in virginity. I know, I know, it’s irony, and she was spectacular in the role, but her “condition” made it hard for me to suspend disbelief the way I would like.

The key to the overwhelming success of this version of one of Shakespeare’s classic folly comedies is the clarity and power of the playwright’s words as delivered by these highly talented actors.

The audience engaged because they could understand what was happening on the stage, whether they were used to the diction or not. I heard the script with fresh ears and glancing around the theater, it was clear I wasn’t alone.

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Review: The Producers

To paraphrase a line from The Producers, Christmas came early to Live Arts this year, and guess who they stuffed in our stocking? Adolf Hitler! This holiday season, Live Art’s production of the wryly-humored musical by Mel Brooks and Thomas Meehan gives the gift of gut-splitting laughter. The Producers is deftly directed by Live Arts Executive Director Matt Joslyn, who took a break from managing to reconnect with the creative process. According to the playbill’s director notes, his primary objective with the show was to “play,” and play he does, in an over-the-top production with a 24-member cast, a 12-member production team, and a crew of 28, all of which manifests as a fast-moving kaleidoscope of craziness.

 

There’s no success like failure for Live Arts’ Doug Schneider and Kip McCharen, who bicker and cajole their way to accidental show-biz fame as Max and Leo in The Producers. Photo courtesy Live Arts.

 

The action begins on a sidewalk in front of a Broadway theater, on opening night of the latest flop by floundering producer Max Bialystock (Doug Schneider). Swirling, smiling patrons besmirch the show with ironic verve in “It’s Opening Night,” cleverly setting the mood for things to come. While lamenting the slump in his career, the greedy, showboating Bialystock is inspired by an observation made by his accountant Leo Bloom (Kip McCharen), that a producer can make more money from a stinker than a success. The duo sets out to make millions by producing the worst play Broadway has ever seen, and thus is born Springtime for Hitler, a musical idolizing the quintessential villain of the 20th century. Mayhem ensues as the show’s playwright and Nazi sympathizer, Franz Liebkind (Tom Howard) is cast in the lead role and flamboyant director Roger DeBris (Noah Grabeel) joins the production.

Live Arts’ show is kept at a breakneck tempo through Robert Benjamin’s well-executed lighting tricks, which keep the action focused on performing actors as others move set pieces, making scene changes practically unnoticeable. The large cast is cleverly manipulated by Joslyn’s brilliant blocking and choreographer Geri Carlson Sauls’ exuberant dance numbers, which utilize every inch of the available space without seeming crowded. Particularly clever is “Along Came Bialy” in which Sauls incorporates metal walkers for percussive and visual effects. But if there were an award for best production element, it would easily go to the costume crew. Kerry Moran and her volunteer staff designed and created an awe-inspiring 108 witty and wild costumes. The audience squealed with delight over the icons of a Springtime for Hitler fashion show, where a bevy of beauties paraded across the stage in a Ziegfeld Follies homage, dressed in showgirl representations of beer, pretzels, bratwurst, and a Wagnerian norse goddess. I laughed so hard my cheeks ached.

Although Joslyn performs miracles with his volunteer cast, all of whom achieve professional level performances, Schneider’s Bialystock dominates the show (and his creepy comb-over hair-do only helps). Schneider plays the role with such shameless sliminess and perfect comedic phrasing that lines like “Who do you have to fuck to get a break in this town?” go beyond offensive and become character defining. He is even able to elicit sympathy during his solo number “Betrayed,” without a hint of sappiness, which is a testament to his ability as an actor.

The one low ebb of this tidal wave of a show is a dance number between Leo and Ulla (Michelle Majorin), the sexy Swedish secretary. Though McCharen is delightfully in-character as the tightly wound Bloom, stilted in movement but purposefully so, and Majorin’s Swedish accent is flawless, the chemistry between the two comes off as frosty and a bit reserved. Those familiar with the play might be a tad underwhelmed here, but on the whole, the show is stellar.

The Producers won an unprecedented 12 Tony Awards when it opened on Broadway in 2001, and Live Arts has truly captured all the glitz, hilarity and irony of the original in its production. When Joslyn and company invite you to play, you’d do well to accept, and luckily, this invitation extends until mid-January.

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The Great Russian Nutcracker comes to the Paramount

When Moscow Ballet brings its sumptuous Great Russian Nutcracker to the States, the company comes bearing gifts of major artistic accomplishment. Each year, two companies of 40 dancers each tour over 60 cities in the United States and Canada, averaging over 100 performances in two months time, offering a unique version of the classic Christmas treat served up with Eastern European flavor.

Moscow Ballet debuted in 1993 with its Great Russian Nutcracker, which is now in its 19th holiday season touring the U.S. Publicity photo.

For those who have seen countless iterations of The Nutcracker, the storyline of Moscow Ballet’s production has its own unique elements, and these twists are also bound to awe those who have yet to see the ballet. In the Great Russian Nutcracker, as in typical American takes on the tale, the story begins with a family Christmas party, and a generous uncle who bestows a nutcracker to the hosts’ daughter, who is commonly known as Clara, but goes by Masha in the Moscow version. That same evening, the nutcracker is broken during some rough play and the girl is despondent. Later, she dreams of a fierce battle between the Christmas toys and some pesky mice in which the mighty nutcracker leads the toys to victory and then turns into a handsome prince. Here is where the similarities between the two Nutcrackers end.

The American brand of The Nutcracker follows the original 1892 storyline of a young girl’s foray into an exotic dreamworld of candy and sweets, The Land of the Sugar Plum Fairy. The Russian version delivers a more romantic vision. “It is a beautiful love story between Masha and her Nutcracker Prince,” explains Nataliya Miroshynk, a solo dancer with Moscow Ballet and five-year veteran of its Great Russian Nutcracker. Although the first act of the story is basically the same as the traditional incarnation, the second follows Masha as additional characters from Russian folklore, including the Snow Maiden and Father Christmas, guide her to a place called The Land of Peace and Harmony. In lieu of characters like Mother Ginger, who greet Clara in The Land of the Sugar Plum Fairy, Masha is welcomed by a cadre of international emissaries from Russia, Spain, France, China, and Arabia to a place where, according to Miroshynk, “all creatures live in accord with one another.” The Sugar Plum Fairy is replaced with the Dove of Peace, and at the end of the second act, Masha is an adult woman who performs a grand pas de deux of love with her prince. The traditional Waltz of the Flowers concludes the performance.

Something else that may surprise audiences in Moscow Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker is the style of dancing. “In the Moscow Ballet we dance in the style of Vaganova, which is different than the American style,” says Miroshynk. “It is more flowing and smoother.” The style to which she refers is named after the famous Russian ballet instructor Agrippina Vaganova, who literally wrote the book on Russian ballet technique, Basic Principles of Classical Ballet. The Vaganova method instigates movement from the torso, condones deliberate hand gestures, and often includes powerful turns and very high jumps. Igor Antonov, a native of Ukraine and an Artistic Associate with the Richmond Ballet explains, “Generally speaking, the Russian style has a long tradition, having started centuries ago. It’s had a long time to develop into a distinct movement style, marked by big movement and strong technique. Especially for the male dancers, the focus is on big jumps, a high level of presentation and bravado, all while keeping the technique intact. The American style is newer, still developing. The movement is more contemporary, and based a lot on what George Balanchine did, with his neo-classical movement. It’s the same technique and steps, but altered slightly, stretched a bit.” Mikhail Baryshnikov, one of the greatest ballet dancers of the 20th century, was trained in the Vaganova method, which distinguished him in America. And if you’ve ever seen Baryshnikov dance, the Great Russian Nutcracker will bring to mind his gravity-defying high jumps and beautifully centered movements. 

The second act of Moscow Ballet’s performance also incorporates puppets by famed Russian set designer and puppeteer Valentin Federov. Puppets are important to Christmas tradition in many parts of Russia, hence their appearance in this production. “Puppetry has been used a lot in religious traditions for centuries, dating back to shamanistic rituals,” says Heidi Rugg, director of Barefoot Puppets, a touring company based in Virginia. “The roots of puppetry are grounded in this magical tradition.” On Christmas Eve, puppeteers in pre-revolutionary Russia would travel from house to house bearing a vertep—a portable puppet theater whose name translates as “secret place”—on a sleigh. Puppet shows depicting stories from the Bible, along with sung Christmas carols, would be presented to families to celebrate the birth of Christ. For the Great Russian Nutcracker, Federov designed 6′ tall stick puppets in homage to the vertep, steeping the show even further in Russian tradition.

Moscow Ballet comes to The Paramount Theater for performances on December 21 and 22. Its message is one of peace and harmony, which may be something you hear a lot during the holiday season, but it’s a rare delight to get it through the medium of dance.

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Review: Dirty Barbie and Other Girlhood Tales

Sometimes it’s good to be reminded that the universe is functioning perfectly despite the challenges it presents us with. We need challenges to carve out who we are, and our job is to accept them, allow ourselves to feel the metaphysical love and move on. This is the lesson of Dirty Barbie and Other Girlhood Tales, the adult version of an adolescent girl’s sleepover, brilliantly written and performed by Denise Stewart, who constructed the piece from posts on her blog.

From Dirty Barbie‘s showing at Hamner Theater in April. You can catch Denise Stewart’s one-woman show on Saturday, December 10 and Sunday, December 11 at Live Arts.

Stewart takes the audience on a wild ride through her dysfunctional Southern childhood, touching on subjects ranging from Barbie’s overt sexuality and teenaged temper tantrums to the slow death of her mother from alcohol abuse. She delivers her message as a montage of experiences, pulling heavily from those of her 4-year-old self and her 1994 college self and presenting them with a pleasing mix of poignancy, humor and dance using Barbie as a metaphor for feminine perfection. You know instantly from the first moments—a Barbie strip-tease—that this show is going to be different in a good way.

Stewart is as fearless in her revelations about universal childhood behavior as she is about the dysfunction of living in an alcoholic household. She manages to seamlessly revert to her child-self, directing stories of inexplicable meanness toward a nice girl and dancing to Michael Jackson’s “PYT,” using moves that are apparently present in the choreography of all tween girls of the era. She then morphs back into an older self to tenderly recount the stories of her mother’s love affair with scotch, or act out a hook-up from a college party, with a Ken doll taking on the role of her young lover. The whole thing is raw and exposing, but so brilliantly spiced with hilarity that the audience is able to joyfully take the entire journey with Stewart without turning it into a pity-party. At one point, Stewart projects a child-like line drawing on a screen depicting her mother next to a house-for-sale sign that reads, “for sale, hurry, I want to die,” and the honesty of the message is both humorous and tragic.

It is this sort of light-hearted effect that makes Dirty Barbie stand out. “Mattel is never going to make a manic depressive Barbie,” Stewart says at the end of the play, which is true because Barbie is fake, of course. The take-away being that reality is messy but somehow we get what we need from the life we’re given. Like that adolescent sleepover, Dirty Barbie has laughter, drama and life lessons involved, but it’s all good in the end.

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Review: Deathtrap

Deathtrap is a theatrical version of an M.C. Escher woodcut, a play within a play with seemingly endless twists and turns that mock the concept of theatrical plot and device. When pulled off, the audience is engaged, if not dizzied, by the wonderment of the tension between the script of the play and its on-stage demands, which are constantly at war with one another (think the famous Escher lithograph Drawing Hands). The show is mind boggling and fun. It is for these reasons that Deathtrap holds the distinction of the longest running comedy-thriller on Broadway and received a Tony nomination for Best Play in 1978. It is also for these reasons that it continues to be produced as it is through December 18, at Play On! Theatre. 

In order to prevent the sidewinding plot from manipulating the production, Deathtrap requires a certain liveliness and impeccable timing. Martyn Kyle, the least experienced of all the actors in the cast, does the best job with energy level and believability in his portrayal of Clifford Anderson. He demonstrates a great natural fluency with the critical timing required to induce great laughs. The audience was particularly delighted by a bit in which Kyle uses well-placed pauses amidst other key clacking cadences as he types on an old fashioned Smith Corona typewriter.The play is set in Westport, Connecticut at the home of Sidney and Myra Bruhl. Sidney has been living off Myra’s money and needs a hit show to boost his ego and their bank account. A young student, Clifford Anderson, has sent him a fantastic script for feedback, and Sydney’s needs start to get the best of him, setting off a chain reaction of deceptions and a few murders. The time period comes into play through the inclusion of hit Barry Manilow tunes, which fill the theatre as patrons enter, and are used to keep the audience engaged during set changes. The set features a hodgepodge of furniture denoting an upper middle class home and an intriguing wall decorated with Sydney’s antique weapons collection. Front and center stage stands Sydney’s writing desk, a symbol of his centrality in the play, as the plot and other characters revolve around him and the writing that happens in that spot.

The impact of Deathtrap’s plot could have been sharpened in Play On!’s production by strengthening the relationships between characters, especially Myra and Sydney, played respectively by Jeannie Jones and William Howard Rough. The actors’ chemistry is at its lowest when Sydney and Myra hug, and what is supposed to be a post-murder flash of sexual attraction gets executed as a “friend” hug —you know, politely touching at the torso like you do with your aunt. A fully-realized connection would up the tension in the production, as well as the excitement.

Play On!’s mission is to provide a space for amateurs to participate in the challenges and joys of live theater production. They do it for the love of theater, but they also put on an engaging, entertaining show. Deathtrap is a great distraction from all the holiday hubbub—especially if you like a good mind bend.

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Review: The Santaland Diaries at Blackfriars

If you are feeling a little more naughty than nice this Christmas season, The Santaland Diaries may be the perfect stuff for your stocking. In the show, a holiday tradition at Staunton’s American Shakespeare Center, seasoned Shakespearean actor Rick Blunt relives humorist David Sedaris’ story about his days as a 30-something man employed as one of Santa’s elves at a Macy’s in Manhatten. The hilariously irreverent one-man show reveals multiple sides of human nature by taking a raw look behind the scenes of one of America’s most sacred traditions, the annual visit to Santa Claus.

Blunt comes out kicking. Hammering hard on Sedaris’ wry words, he brings his own voice to the piece, which is traditionally delivered in Sedaris’ own whiney, slightly effete manner. Blunt also brings his own comedic skills to the fore with his “regular guy” style of delivery and physicality. Just by being a big burley sort, Blunt evokes laughter as he shows off his red and white candy-cane striped tights, giving his performance a visual absurdity all its own.

Blunt is also brilliant at presenting the other characters in the piece. Particularly fun are his spot-on depictions of a smarmy Santaland coworker he calls “The Walrus” where he blatantly flirts with a female patron, and his version of “Santa Santa,” a somewhat delusional Santaland co-worker. I even found myself happily cheering “S-A-N-T-A” with the rest of the audience led by Blunt, whose real genius in the piece is his ability to make his depiction of Santaland inviting and engaging.

Although the evening was quite entertaining, Blunt lost his place in the monologue more than once—although technically, the evening was a dress rehearsal—something that will certainly be remedied for upcoming performances. His overtly masculine interpretation of the script works overall, and even infuses it with some darker meanings. It’s humorous when an effeminate interpretation of Sedaris’ character tells a little girl she has a waist most women would kill for, but a tad disturbing when Blunt says it. The bit in which Crumpet receives flirtatious overtures from a fellow elf named Snowball is similarly different in tone in Blunt’s version. Did I mention this show is recommended for adult audiences only?

The Santaland Diaries does a great job of balancing out all the sugary sweetness of earnest holiday shows like A Christmas Carol or The Homecoming. When the holidays inevitably drive us up the wall, we need to hear that Santa is an anagram for Satan. Which isn’t to say we don’t have room in our hearts for lines like “God bless us, everyone,” but every once in a while, there’s nothing like hearing “Now get your ass on Santa’s lap and smile before I give you something to cry about!”

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The King and I; The Paramount Theater; Saturday, July 30

If you’re wondering why Ash Lawn Opera chose this year to produce Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic musical The King and I, with its dated themes of conformity and imperialism, look no further than the 20 or so local kids in the cast. Ah, the children, each wrapped in bright silks, collectively looking like a bag of hard candies, beaming adorableness all over the stage—each attracting their parents, grandparents, school chums (and so on) to the opera festival.

 

Elizabeth Andrews Roberts plays Anna Leonowens, an English widow who lands a post as teacher to the children of the King of Siam in The King and I. Photo from Moore-Coll Photography.
In spite of a few technical flaws (about which more later), the annual festival’s production of the The King and I is gorgeous in its presentation and good entertainment for the kids, as well as those who cart them around. Expertly directed by Broadway veteran Baayork Lee, who played Princess Ying in the original Broadway production, and impeccable in its design, the talent here is top-notch. In a nod to the operatic tradition Rodgers and Hammerstein drew from, the play is performed without amplification.
Elizabeth Andrews Roberts portrays a headstrong yet genteel Anna Leonowens, an English widow who lands a post as teacher to the children of the King of Siam in 1860. The King is brilliantly captured by Seth Mease Carico, a smooth bass baritone who lends swagger and charm to the “barbaric” bigamist ruler. Meanwhile, Roberts’ Leonowens represents all that is English and, therefore, right and good in the world.
 
The production’s highlight is the play within the play, “The Small House of Uncle Thomas,” Tuptim’s theatrical interpretation of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” performed in stylized Thai theater with masks and simple props. Where the rest of the play is a British dilution of Siamese culture, the segment explores a Western concept from an Eastern perspective. The mini-drama showcases the production’s overall thoughtfulness—particularly Susan Kikuchi’s choreography, Nuria Carrasco’s costumes. Scott Wirtz-Olsen’s lighting also shines, in particular the water-silk washed effect on the back scrim that is used throughout the show.
 
That said, there were disconcerting imperfections throughout the performance. One might expect a gaffe or two on opening night, but a nearly a half-dozen missed lighting cues is inexcusable in a production of this caliber. At one point in the first scene the cast was practically in the dark, and at another, fireworks were set off before they were called for in the script. During a somber death scene, the lead actors were forced to ad-lib lines as the children were herded onstage, apparently late for their cue. But most disappointing of all to this writer was Anna’s ball costume, which was flat compared to her other impressive costumes. It resulted in a lack of dramatic flash for the famous romantically charged polka scene.
 
It is summer, after all, and some of our brains should be on vacation. The King and I is good clean fun. So in that spirit, “Shall we dance?”