23
Aug
2011
For what it is, the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's Nana's Naughty Knickers is rather amusing and somewhat unexpected. The title, for me, conjures up images of scantily clad grannies telling off-color, elderly-themed jokes in a wild farce. Instead, playwright Katherine DiSavino's piece is a mild farce, with a unique plot and interesting, likable characters (and only a handful of age-based jokes). I didn't laugh quite as much as I expected to during Friday's opening-night performance, but I was more engaged than I anticipated I would be, and interested in where DiSavino would take her characters.
What happens if you give a mouse a cookie? Nothing good, if you're the cookie giver. If, however, you're watching what unfolds by way of the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's current youth-theatre offering, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, it's a delightful experience.
"I think it came from going to church," says area actor Pat Flaherty of his childhood interest in theatre. "Because I'd go to church, and I'd see this guy who was holding everybody's interest through the whole service. It was very dramatic - they'd light the candles and ring the bells and everything - and for a while I thought I wanted to be a priest because of that.
The Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's Hairspray lacks polish from what seems to be, in the chorus roles, a fairly green cast. Yet even though that softens the strength of the production, it doesn't seem to diminish any of the fun. I had an incredibly good time watching Saturday night's performance, and while the entire show isn't quite worth the standing ovation it received, the final song, "You Can't Stop the Beat," does deserve that special accolade intended for exceptional performances.
My enjoyment of the Harrison Hilltop Theatre company's Same Time, Next Year was inhibited by the moral issues at the core of the play.
Not being a child myself, I can only imagine the delight that kids feel at seeing a much-loved book played out, on stage, before their eyes - which is what's currently happening in the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's production of Alexander & the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. While I've personally never read author Judith Viorst's work, I do know it's a popular story among younger readers, and those in the audience during Saturday morning's performance certainly seemed to like what they were seeing. (They were also at least familiar enough with the source material to be able to shout out the show's title without a hitch... though I'd bet many could recite much more than that part of the book by heart.)
[Author's note: The following was written for 
If the goal of Happy Days: A New Musical - making its Midwestern debut at the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse - is to have the feel of the 1970s TV series, then playwright (and series creator) Garry Marshall and songwriter Paul Williams are working against each other. The book is reminiscent of the sitcom, with similar character dynamics and situations, but it comes across as a caricature of the TV show - purely wholesome, without the slight edge and hints of rebellion present in its televised incarnation. Williams' songs, meanwhile, don't suggest the series at all; it's as if the tunes were taken from some other 1950s-themed musical, and plopped into an episode of Happy Days without consideration for whether they fit the characters.
Sitting down for Thursday's performance of Frost/Nixon, the set for the Harrison Hilltop Theatre's production heightened my concerns that I would likely be bored during the show. Even before arriving at the theatre, I anticipated struggling to concentrate, knowing I'm not much interested in history. But adding the minimalist approach to the set, with three platforms embellished by a strip of black rising up their centers, my hopes that the visuals, at least, would offer some interest dwindled. (While the look of the set is creative, I'm just not into minimalism.) It didn't take long, though, for director Tristan Layne Tapscott's efforts to prove my worries unwarranted, and by the end of the play, I was actually thankful for the simple set, as it didn't at all distract from the players' performances.
Good God, is the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's All Shook Up fun. The high energy on stage kicks into overdrive with the first song, "Jailhouse Rock," and barely lets up as the cast sings, dances, and emotes its way through many of Elvis Presley's hits. I was thrilled with the opening-night performance, and my lingering excitement has me still smiling as I write this the day after seeing the jukebox musical.
