items tagged with Irving Berlins White Christmas

No show that opens with 10 sharply dressed, great-looking, terrifically talented performers dancing a spirited tap number can be all that bad, which is a good thing for Holly Jolly Christmas, the musical revue currently playing at the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse. Considering, however, that the production has no loftier purposes beyond entertaining crowds with familiar holiday tunes and spreading a little yuletide cheer, I think audiences could be easily forgiven for turning to their theatre-going companions after the curtain call and saying, "Well, that was nice... but what the hell was it?"

At last count, there were a whopping 46 area-theatre productions scheduled between September and December, and included among the titles are A Dog's Life, The Big Funk, Scrooge!, Don't Hug Me, and Mid-Life! The Crisis Musical. It's the season that my editor, Jeff, has been waiting for!

I love making lists. Love it. And I get an annual charge out of composing "10 best"s for the Reader based on my movie-going experiences: 10 Best Films, 10 Best Guilty Pleasures, 10 Best Action Blockbusters Based on a Pre-Existing
Toy ... .

So when I started thinking about my forthcoming Year in Theatre recap a few weeks ago, I thought it might make for a fun change of pace to compose "best" lists for area stage productions.

For 2006's Year in Theatre recap, I included a list of 12 talents whose gifts couldn't help but be noticed, as they had performed exemplary work on a number of theatrical offerings during the year, oftentimes at a number of area venues.

It's the list so nice I'm doin' it twice!

Among those I spoke with during the show's subsequent opening-night party, the prevailing opinion seemed to be that the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's new production of Irving Berlin's White Christmas was superior to the 2006 production, and I guess that maybe, in several respects, it was.