OREM — When I told people I was going to the Hale Center Theater Orem to watch The Girl, The Grouch and The Goat, people said, “The Grouchy Girl and the Goat?” or something like, “The Grouch and the Who? Never heard of it. Is that a new Sesame Street Musical?” Continue Reading

PROVO — Romeo and Juliet is the second of a summer-long double feature from Utah Shakespeare in the Park (the first was Much Ado About Nothing, in June). And, while Romeo and Juliet is an enjoyable evening of theater—how can an outdoor production of a Shakespeare classic be anything else?—it does have its problems. Continue Reading

PROVO – The life of a young lay minister was forever changed when he came across what he called “a very strange book” in 1830.  But this book “was the principal means, in the hands of God, of directing the entire course of my future life,” as related in Thom Duncan’s insightful and often moving one-man religious play Preposterous Parley P! The very strange book was the Book of Mormon, and the life that was altered was that of early Mormon leader Parley P. Pratt. Continue Reading

PAYSON — Payson Community Theater has been called, “the best kept secret in Utah theater”; and for just cause. Playing to sold out audiences for their recent productions of Cats, Beauty and the Beast and last year’s production of The Wizard of Oz, plan on coming early to get a seat to this year’s show, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Once again PCT delivers an A+ production.  The strength of Payson Community Theater’s interpretation comes from the details in the performing/directing and the technical coordination.  This is the best production of Joseph I have ever seen performed in Utah because of this attention to details. Continue Reading

OREM — 2010 marks the 150th anniversary of Annie Oakley’s birth. Annie Get Your Gun is a fictionalized account of the high-spirited Oakley and the romance she develops with Frank Butler, a famous marksman in Wild West variety shows. Continue Reading

OREM — At the conclusion of Big River: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Huck explains to the audience, “It was like the fortune predicted long ago: considerable trouble and considerable joy.”  And there’s considerable joy—both displayed on stage and experienced by the fortunate audience—in the Sundance Summer Theater’s must-see co-production with Utah Valley University. Continue Reading

AMERICAN FORK — The Music Man is an enduring American musical classic and has been a staple of both big and small theater companies since it first swept through Broadway in 1957, earning a Tony over West Side Story for Best Musical, along with Tony honors for Robert Preston and Barbara Cook. The faithful film adaptation five years later won an Academy Award for Best Musical Score and a nomination for Best Picture. Continue Reading

OREM — There are two kinds of reviews: first, the travel advisory; the ‘hey, if you’re going out tonight, here’s a little heads up on your choices’; and second, the pronouncement of value; the Anton-Ego- a’-la-Ratatouille, set in stone enshrinement as glorious art or trash. So here’s the problem . . . Mr. Ego (or his corporeal equivalent), I am not . . . and the play’s run is already over, so they’re both out.  So, where does that leave us? Continue Reading

PROVO — I walk into the Provo Theater space, my very favorite local theater, to see a life-size mummy sarcophagus! I have a feeling this is going to be great! But, while there certainly was greatness to be found in this production of short plays by Mahonri Stewart, overall it was a pretty bewildering theatrical experience.

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PROVO — I’ve never been to a roadshow before, but I think I stumbled upon one tonight.  Erin’s Promise was a sincere effort of a musical, but felt more like a stake musical fireside–a produced, fully thought-out fireside, but a fireside nonetheless. Scene changes took minutes upon minutes, transition music sounded like it came from a boom box backstage, and in many scenes characters were mere set pieces–stoic, uninteresting, and without more than a hint of urgency. Continue Reading