Spring Awakens at 5th Avenue Theatre

Lauren Drake and Ciara Alyse Harris in Spring Awakening (Mark Kitaoka)

Spring Awakening
5^th Avenue Theatre
Through June 30, 2024
 
This is the third time I have seen Spring Awakening on stage. I saw the initial Broadway touring show in 2007, an iconic and much better (than the touring show) version by Balagan Theatre in 2012 that is remembered for a compelling performance by Jinkx Monsoon (just before she became Jinkx Monsoon) and included cast members Diana Huey and Solea Pfeiffer, and now this one at the 5^th.
 
The best part of this musical is the songs and this cast has killer pipes! The harmonies are sweet and there are some standout performers among a pretty cool cast. Two singers new to me are Ciara Alyse Harris and Lauren Drake, both of whom I would love to see/hear more of.

Back from the Future – I Mean Now… with Jinkx Monsoon and Major Scales at Seattle Rep

Jinkx Monsoon at Seattle Rep (Nate Watters)

Jinkx Monsoon and Major Scales Together Again, Again!
Seattle Rep
Through 6/23/24
 
Many people love drag shows around here and we have some high profile performers like Dina Martina, Ben de la Crème, and Scott Shoemaker’s Ms. Pak-Man character. They are beloved by their audiences. They are reliably talented performers with plenty of pizzazz. Sometimes, though, shows that are really funny for a while get worn out when stretched past the premise.
 
Such is the case with beloved ex-local, Jinkx Monsoon, and her talented music-composing side-kick, Major Scales. They are both fully capable performers, and if they weren’t they wouldn’t have achieved the notoriety and fame they’ve already achieved. Having enjoyed earlier iterations of their shows together, I was hopeful that their new show, Jinkx Monsoon and Major Scales Together Again, Again!, would benefit from the heaps of different show business growth that has helped them hone their talents to a fierce shine.
 
Their new production’s gimmick is that they have been separated from each other for many years, with resentments and beefs galore, but now, in the year 2065, “the sun has exploded, a dystopian nightmare has been realized, and the world has been taken over by authoritarian lizard people,” (says the pr blurb) and maybe it’s time to reunite and bury their hatchets.

June Theater: Shorts Galore and Soon Free Park Shows!

Tracy Michelle Hughes, Reginald André Jackson, Deja Culver, Jacob Alcazar, Joe Moore in Clyde's at ArtsWest

June is packed with shorts festivals and the start of theater (and dance) in the parks! Get out yer calendars!
 
Clyde's, ArtsWest and The Hansberry Project, 6/6-30/24
Lynn Nottage’s latest Broadway triumph introduces the formerly incarcerated kitchen staff of Clyde’s, a truck stop cafe. Even as the shop’s mischievous owner tries to keep them under her thumb, the staffers are given purpose and permission to dream.
www.artswest.org
 
Distillery New Works Festival, Seattle Public Theater, already happened
Each play in the festival receives a live reading with a cast of professional actors and a director. The readings conclude with a moderated discussion of the play with the playwright. Funnie by Jessica Moss, Impossible Theories Of Us by John Mabey, Li by Wei He, The Park by Lisa Every and Jenn Ruzumna, Possessed by Gloria Majule, Safe Hands by Alara Magritte and Daniel Rosen, Skin by Anamaria Guerzon.
www.seattlepublictheater.org
 
Spring Awakening, 5^th Avenue Theatre, 6/7-30/24
Spring Awakening is an electrifying journey through the trials and challenges of adolescence, with music by Duncan Sheik. The story explores the mystery of attraction, desire, sex, insecurity, and the highs and lows of navigating the pressures of young adult life. With a score of contemporary rock music that transformed the way Broadway thinks about musicals, Spring Awakening is a poignant and thrilling ride that stings with resonance for today’s youth.
www.5thavenue.org

Fierce Farceurs of Fun at Taproot

Nathan Brockett and Sophia Franzella (photo by Robert Wade)

Sherlock Holmes and the Precarious Position
Taproot Theatre
Through June 22, 2024 (happily extended)
 
Taproot Theatre has a clear preference for plays by Margaret Raether. They’ve done many of her Jeeves plays in recent years which are quite fun escapes from the doldrums of life, provide a laugh and a bit of mystery to solve. Raether has also written a “Sherlock Holmes” play, but rather than base it on a real Conan Doyle story, she’s crafted her own mystery and a version of Holmes that is far less serious than what you might be used to.
 
Here, her Holmes (played by Calder Jameson Shilling) is more gleeful than glum and more of a trickster than terse. She makes Dr. Watson the narrator (Nathaniel Tenenbaum), though some of the narration gets a bit muddy script-wise. Watson is also much less of a sober sidekick, with more emphasis on “kick” and less on “side.”
 
Shilling and Tenenbaum bring their usual finesse to these, as any, roles. But the real, dizzying work of the play is done by two well-known Seattle clowns, Nathan Brockett and Sophia Franzella. Brockett and Franzella play every other character in the script with costume changes (wonderfully designed by Pete Rush) that are so quick, sometimes, that they seem impossible.

“Unrivaled” Layer Upon Layer of Intrigue (With Fun!)

Alanah Pasqual, Pearl Lam, Adele Lim in "Unrivaled" at Seattle Public Theater 

Unrivaled
SiSProductions and Seattle Public Theater
Through June 2, 2024
 
The opening moments of Unrivaled, in a co-production between SiS Productions and Seattle Public Theater, immediately propel you into every aspect of Rosie Narasaki’s fascinating play about 1000-year-old Japanese writers Lady Murasaki and Lady Sei. Director Mimi Katano brilliantly sets the mood and the music.
 
Precise dance moves; specific use of fans; a gauzy, simple, effective set by Robin Macartney; and elliptical conversations that hint at layers beyond layers of meaning. These elements plus a trio of super actors create a 100-minute production that flies by.
 
Adele Lim starts to narrate the story as Empress Teishi with such cuteness it’s impossible not to laugh, but also demonstrates instantaneous ability to change her demeanor and after setting herself up as a ditz, also asks some of the very smartest questions in the script.
 
Teishi describes her court and the intrigue surrounding royal family secret and not so secret attempts at rising to the top. She shrugs her shoulders at the culture that marries off all the daughters to the rising sons as a way to keep power in the family. She details the most recent spate of deaths and successions. She also introduces how her court includes the smartest lady writers recruited to write and publish for an information-starved populace.

‘The Lehman Trilogy’ Tells A Lot, Shows Little

 

Robert Pescovitz, Bradford Farwell, Brandon J. Simmons
in The Lehman Trilogy (Rosemary Dai Ross)

The Lehman Trilogy
ACT Theatre 

Through May 19, 2024

Does the ACT Theatre production of The Lehman Trilogy stand up to the play? Or does the play stand up to ACT’s version?
 
Of the Broadway production in 2021, Charles Isherwood, critic at Broadway News, said, “But for all its surface stylishness, "The Lehman (Trilogy)" is a stolid and rather monolithic slab of a show: a three hour and twenty minute talking Wikipedia page, so dense with description and narration, and devoid of drama - or even dialogue - that watching it is like watching very expensive paint dry, or maybe, to use a more apt metaphor, listening to cotton growing.”
 
There are a lot of glowing reviews out there that beckon you to come see an amazing story. The story is, indeed, amazing, though 160 years in the making. However, the script by Ben Power (from the first iteration by Stephano Massini), is written in what Seattle might think of as “The Book-It Style” where people refer to themselves in third person (Henry says, “He looked hard at his brother.” While looking hard at his brother.).
 
Book-It Repertory Theatre used that style often to great effect while also working very hard to theatricalize the novel it was based upon. Here, though, it’s a history book. This history tries to conflate decades into three plus hours. Three actors portray three brothers and all the myriad other characters throughout their lives.