In the world before, when the availability of musical theater was just a given, just another one of life’s perks I took for granted, there was a show that hadn’t yet been available, at least not to me. I’d been perked up, waiting to see it since it became the next big thing in 2016 or 2017, waiting for the national tour to hit Chicago. Missing the brief 2019 stopover, I was all set for the 2020 production…

…now, here in 2022 or whenever it is, that production is finally here…

And yes, the current run of Dear Evan Hansen at the James M. Nederlander Theatre was worth the wait!

In the ensuing years, our whirlwind world’s made media and songs and moments come and go, and I’d totally forgotten about the show, about what I’d known about it before, about all the hype all those hype cycles ago. Which made me come into this production more in the dark than I think I ever have for a show. This was new, like if I’d walked into Broadway’s Music Box Theatre in 2016, before all the hype and the Tony awards and everything else, and I was just there to enjoy a really good musical. And this musical proved to be just that, thanks to a stellar cast and crew.

As the titular Evan, Anthony Norman transforms himself over the course of the show. At first, I wasn’t sure if his jitters were actual jitters or the character, even as he showed he could really sing. But Norman’s Evan really comes out of his shell, for better or for worse, as the story progresses. And what a voice—I’ve still got “For Forever” going through my head.

Because, despite the heavy subject material, and the light the show has shone on important issues, this show is less about its story than it is about the songs and the opportunities they give a cast of really skilled vocalists to sing them. And this cast sing the heck out of them.

The star of the show, for both me and my daughter, was Nikhil Saboo as Connor Murphy. Sullen and intimidating and scary in life, Saboo’s Connor as 21^st-century Jacob Marley is the exact opposite—providing a heavy show some of its lighter moments, especially when he leads Evan and a friend through the hilarious “Sincerely, Me.”

And Evan’s friends all get their moments, as well. Alaina Anderson’s Zoe Murphy transforms as the show goes on, much like Evan. And Pablo David Laucerica’s Jared and Micaela Lamas’ Alana bring both levity and humanity—both of them skilled character actors and both talented singers—as do John Hemphill and Lili Thomas as the Murphy parents.

But Coleen Sexton’s overworked and doing-her-best mother, Heidi Hansen, is perhaps the truest character, the heart of the play, looking in at others’ hurt while navigating her own, while navigating life. Maybe it’s me, as the dad there with his kid, but Sexton was the show’s heart and soul, and the show has a lot.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the show’s musicians, visible above and behind David Korins’ screentime set. Garret Healey leads the orchestra through all of these wonderful songs, including beautiful cello by Tahirah Whittington and great guitar work by Matt Brown and Eric Stockton.

When I wanted so badly to see Dear Evan Hansen all those years ago, I had no clue how long I’d wait to see it. But the waiting made seeing this current production, playing at the James M. Nederlander Theatre through December 31, all the sweeter.

One of my earliest memories going to a movie theater is seeing Clue on the big screen. It not only started a lifetime love of Tim Curry, but cemented the Parker Brothers board game as the only board game little me ever wanted to play. And it still remains as a formative moment in my love of a good story told or performed well.

And that is what the Mercury Theater’s current production of Clue did once again. I actually brought my youngest child, about the same age I was when I saw the movie, and I delighted in watching her delight almost as much as I enjoyed the production…because boy, it’s delightful.

Just like Tim Curry in the film version, Mark David Kaplan as Wadsworth the butler steals the show, his expressions and physicality leading us down the fun and thrilling corridors of the mansion he mans. Wadsworth welcomes six guests for an evening of mystery and murder, and each character brings the mayhem.

Jonah D. Winston’s Colonel Mustard is all buffoonish bluster, towering over the cast in both size and sonority. McKinley Carter’s Mrs. White is over the top, as are Nancy Wagner’s Mrs. Peacock and Andrew Jessop’s Professor Plum, caricatures of characters we know as people even if they were once just brightly colored plastic play pieces. Mr. Green, played by Kelvin Roston, Jr., adds a sense of fear, even if I remember how the story ends for him. But both my daughter and I agreed that the most fun character (and the one we fight over being when playing the game) was Miss Scarlet, played with sizzle and swank by Erica Stephan.

Well, Miss Scarlet would be the swankiest and most sizzling person onstage if not for Honey West, most recently seen stealing scenes in the Mercury’s Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. The Chicago cabaret icon shows up throughout Clue, taking part in some of the show’s best slapstick gags.

Just like the time I had all those years ago watching the movie, as well as the hours and hours of fun the board game has given me, the Mercury Theater’s production of Clue—playing now through January 1, 2023—is every bit the hour or two of laughs and thrills and loads of fun that I remember from childhood.

Arriving at the quaint Mercury Theater—a century-old nickelodeon turned comfy neighborhood cabaret—for Priscilla Queen of the Desert, the excitement of the other theatergoers coming and going, outside near the Music Box Theater and inside the Mercury’s cabaret room sipping their drinks, hinted at the show I was about to see. And what a show…

The Mercury’s cast and crew, led by director and choreographer Christopher Chase Carter, have gone all out in their production of the musical based on Stephan Elliott’s 1994 hit movie. The colorful posters outside, the flashing disco ball cocktail cups one can get filled with the cabaret bar’s signature punch, and the audience’s bright attire only hinted at the lights and dazzle onstage.

From the moment the first actor steps onstage, it’s a spectacle. Costume designer Bob Kuhn’s dressed a cast of all body types in the flashiest drag costumes and the dustiest duds from the Outback (and even a wrestling singlet or two, which made me LOL) as Tick/Mitzi, Adam/Felicia, and Bernadette waltz across Australia in Priscilla, their bus. What a feat to costume such a varied cast and make every member stand out, and stand onstage as confidently as the three leads.

Said leads are all wonderful. Josh Houghton’s Tick is a paradox of towering cool and nervous angst, professional and polished onstage as Mitzi and the story’s protagonist who brings the others along on his own adventure. Shaun White plays the beautiful young Adam/Felicia, whose exuberance and humor keep the trip interesting. And legendary Chicago cabaret performer Honey West is perfect as Bernadette, her talent and mere presence lending the performance gravitas.

But the rest of the cast proves the leads’ equal. Darren Patin’s Miss Understanding starts off the show right, and Patin continues throughout in a killer ensemble featuring Ayana Strutz, John Cardone, Michael Kingston, Brittany Parker, Marcus Jackson, and Matthew Weidenbener. The show’s divas—Lydia Burke, Jessica Brooke Seals, and Heather J. Beck—sizzle in Kuhn’s outfits and stun with their vocals, under Eugene Dizon’s musical direction. But perhaps the vocals that most astounded me came from Gabriel Solis, a young actor making his professional debut on the Mercury Theater’s stage.

And if you have not seen it yet, make your own debut through the Mercury’s doors for this spectacular production of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, playing through September 11.

You’ve got to give Marriott Theatre credit for always swinging for the fences. Just this past year, I’ve seen them put on The Sound of Music and West Side Story, two shows that any audience will know as well as the cast. But that’s because these beloved shows are beloved by audiences, because they are that good. And the Marriott Theatre can always pull it off—putting on great productions of said shows and leaving audiences thrilled in the process—because of the consistency and quality of their casts and their crew.

Marriott’s current production of The Wizard of Oz—an abridged but always charming version “for all ages”—is the theater’s latest big swing. And they do not miss. The audience, truly of all ages, was enthralled for the hour-long runtime, enchanted by the standards that were sung and the famous lines that were delivered, by the immersive Land of Oz allowed by the theater’s in-the-round setup and by the magical characters who live there.

But first, we Dorothy. Earlier this year, Campbell Krausen was a standout in Marriott’s Sound of Music, playing the angsty Austrian near-seventeen-year-old Liesl von Trapp. Now, Krausen finds herself not in the Alps, but in Kansas, and gives a smiling and wide-eyed performance as Dorothy Gale. Once in Oz, Krausen’s drab rural surroundings give way to a colorful world made more so by the cast.

Harriet Nzinga Plumpp has all the haughty cheer that Glinda the Good Witch must possess. Jacquelyne Jones strikes fear into any of us who, as children, watched Margaret Hamilton through closed eyes on the TV screen. Allison Sill’s Scarecrow flops and cavorts like a regular Ray Bolger (Sill also hosted a sweet Q&A session with the audience afterwards). Michael Turrentine’s Tin Man is all heart. And Lorenzo Rush Jr.’s Cowardly Lion is a hoot. Once Kevin McKillip’s Oz steps out from behind the curtain, he too is stellar.

But it’s the ensemble who make this show really special. I have seen Laura Savage in a few shows now—everything from A Chorus Line to Newsies—and each time I’ve seen her, whether she’s headlining or working hard on the chorus line, she’s been the MVP. Here, she does her thing, joining Mandy Modic (who’s also the human and handler of the handsome gentleman playing Toto, Sir Reginald) and Matthew Bettencourt (who’s all Munchkin energy and Emerald City wonder) to become the terrifying twister, the grateful folk of Munchkinland, the Wicked Witch’s enslaved henchmen, and more.

And these people are the reason that Marriott Theatre is able to consistently put on worthy productions of the standards—these talented actors all bring their gifts to the Marriott stage, where they show that they love the Land of Oz and all of its wizardry and wonder every bit as much as the audiences lucky enough to see them perform, here in The Wizard of Oz, through August 7.

For most of us—those reviewing theater or those thinking about attending or just about anyone, I guess—Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music is omnipresent. Just a part of our existence. The original soundtrack in everyone’s grandmother’s vinyl collection, with all of those songs. The 1960s film version that once played on television annually, a family event (at least for mine). And all of the attached memories. It’s like The Wizard of Oz or The Bible or The Beatles. It just is and always has been, and we all have some kind of connection to it.

So, with that in mind, I was both excited to see the Marriott Theater’s new production of The Sound of Music, but also wondered how anyone might put on a production that can compete with memory, with perfection, with Julie Andrews. But, like so many other wonderful Marriott shows, Nick Bowling’s The Sound of Music delights.

The level of talent on the stage becomes clear right from the start. Nuns from an Austrian abbey parade down the theater-in-the-round’s four aisles with candles, then launch into the show’s opening “Preludium.” With all the beloved classic songs to come, this is still the moment of the show that stuck with me most—the cast throws down the gauntlet, announcing they can sing, and do they ever. I got chills from the acapella chorus. I’ve got chills remembering it as I type.

And then we meet Maria. While no Julie Andrews, Marriott newcomer Addie Morales doesn’t need to be. She’s herself, and she charms as soon as the spotlight first hits her. A lovely singer who shows off her range, it’s her overall being that shines from the stage just as much as her voice. Again, while all her own woman, Morales shares Andrews’ ability to draw the eye and ear whenever she’s onstage.

But the rest of the cast, those not in the nunnery, are every bit as good. The children, who I worried might be hamming or annoying, were all very genuine. Campbell Krausen, who plays 16-year-old Leisl, not only shows awkward teenage chemistry with Emmet Smith’s Rolf, she really seems to encourage and mother-hen her onstage siblings. Brody Tyner as Friedrich has not just astonishing vocal chops, but accompanies on guitar on a couple numbers. Erik Hellman plays Captain Georg Von Trapp, family patriarch with a rough edge that eventually softens.

Marriott’s ensemble, as always, is consummate. Heidi Kettenring and Rob Lindley really work as the two on-the-fence Nazis who provide a bit of drama and plot to this story that’s really about all those songs. And those songs... Again, the entire cast can sing. And they’re made all the better by conductor Patti Garwood’s orchestra. And, if you want to realize just what songs they are, what a show this is, and what a wonderful production that The Marriott Theatre is presenting of The Sound of Music, find out for yourself, now through June 5 in Lincolnshire.

Of all the theaters whose return I’ve been most excited to experience, Theo Ubique was near the top of the list. And, with their current production of Mary Rodgers’ Once Upon a Mattress, directed by Landree Fleming, the Evanston company did not disappoint.

While Once Upon a Mattress is a rollicking take on Hans Christian Andersen’s beloved “The Princess and the Pea”—humor we’ll get to in a second—it’s not without its heart. The love story between Sir Harry and Lady Larken provides the heart in this production. Parker Guidry’s Lady Larken is often the stately center of a production with all manner of hilarity occurring all around, and their onstage and vocal chemistry with Michael Metcalf’s Harry is real. Not to be outdone, Sonia Goldberg as the titular princess also brings the vocals.

And then the rest of the cast turns this love story into something fun. As Princess Winnifred’s love interest, Prince Dauntless, August Forman lights up the stage with their childlike preening and pouting, often dueling with their mother, Queen Aggravain, played totally over-the-top (in the best way possible) by Anne Sheridan Smith.

The Queen’s husband, King Sextimus, is forced to go over-the-top on account of his being mute. And Andrew Fortman turns this disadvantage into comedy gold, miming his way across the theater floor, often with Jasmine Lacy Young’s Poet and Michael M. Ashford’s Jester (especially in the trio for two, “The Poet, The Jester and I”). Ashford’s “Very Soft Shoes” dance routine also brought smiles.

But it’s all the movement and action and stuff constantly going on across Theo Ubique’s floor that most delights. That can be chalked up to Jenna Schoppe’s choreography (captained and assisted by J Alan, who also moves the story along as the Wizard). But it’s just as much the talented ensemble of Theo Ubique that keeps the show going—Sarah J. Patin, Nathe Rowbotham, Peter Ruger, and Laura Sportiello are every bit as vital as the rest of the cast, dancing, singing, sweating, and smiling to bring life to the kingdom.

And the smile they brought to my face showed that Theo Ubique is indeed back, doing what Theo Ubique does—bringing life to a beloved show, bringing smiles to those who wander into the cozy storefront off Howard Street, and bringing joy to Chicago’s theater community once again. Share in that joy as Theo Ubique presents Once Upon a Mattress, now through May 1.

I’m not sure how long this honeymoon feeling of returning to life as a theatergoer will last. That butterflies-in-the-belly, waiting-for-the-lights-to-go-out feeling just before the show starts. Right now, I tell myself that it’ll last forever. That I’ll never take for granted what I was—and all of you lovers of a good show done well were—lucky enough to enjoy until the past two years. That I’ll watch every show like it could be my last. Who knows if this feeling will last? I hope it does.

But I’ll tell you what…the cast and crew of Marriott Theatre’s West Side Story are putting on a production that shows that us theatergoers weren’t the only ones itching to get back to it, putting on a show like it could be their last.

That the production is Leonard Bernstein’s classic was a great choice. Its content, while still thought-provoking and fitting for our fractured world all these decades later, is also well-known, proven, comforting. We know what to expect, the cast and crew know what to do, and then we all hope it goes according to script.

It does here. The two leads, Lauren Maria Medina as Maria and Jake David Smith as Tony, are both very talented vocalists, comfortable with the challenging melodies Bernstein gives them. They play their parts, they sing their songs, they live their lives, as the Maria and Tony we as the audience want.

The roles of Anita and Bernardo, of course, won best supporting Oscars for the 1961 film version, and here they are filled by Vanessa Aurora Sierra and Gary Cooper. Sierra captured my attention whenever she was onstage, bringing not just the passion the role calls for but a real joy, too. Gary Cooper (that name!) brought physicality to Bernardo and the fight scenes, but matched Sierra in having that extra presence, too.

The ensemble—a highlight is the Shark Girls led by Sierra in a rousing, syncopated “America”—pulls off stunning dance numbers and tightly choreographed fight scenes, and does them well. And, like the four actors mentioned above, they give each of them that little something extra, that little bit of joy that just makes this a production to see and enjoy.

Because, like I said, West Side Story can certainly still make us think—still is making me think—socially, about what can be done to make life better. But West Side Story—done so well, now through March 27—also shows us how good life is, how good life can be. We have these beloved songs and characters, and we have such talented people like those in this cast and crew who will give that little bit more to live up to the material, who will play each show like it might be their last, and who, thank goodness, are still here to provide us grateful fans that feeling you get when you’re waiting for the lights to go out and for the show to start.

West Side Story is being performed at Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire through March 27^th.

As I ascended Madison Street early Saturday afternoon, my daughter’s hand in mine, Samuel Insull’s Civic Opera House rose up before us, throne-like, a sight that once greeted me daily in our old world with its bustling downtown and delights we took for granted. But our excitement — not just to visit the Joffrey Ballet’s new home, but to visit theater, arts, entertainment, anything — was matched by the excitement of every single theatergoer who’d dressed up and come downtown for the return of the Joffrey’s Nutcracker, a tradition I hope none of us will take for granted again.

The last time I attended the Joffrey, the company was still in the grand old Auditorium Theatre, one of my favorite buildings (and theaters) not just in Chicago, but anywhere. But this weekend, as I set foot in a theater for the first time since early March 2020, I was also for the first time visiting the Joffrey’s new home at the Lyric Opera. And what a return it was.

Just seeing the bustling, eager crowd in the lobby — their faces masked and their vaccination cards visible, but their holiday finery just as prominently on display as in years past — marked a return. Maybe not to normal. But maybe, I hope, to something as good… or better. A normal we appreciate.

Because I know, after seeing the Joffrey’s Nutcracker for the first time in two years, I will never not appreciate this annual tradition for the treasure it is.

The Joffrey’s take on Tchaikovsky’s holiday chestnut has become a treasured tradition itself — in its sixth year now, minus 2020 — its story by beloved children’s author Brian Selznick set amid the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893.

And the return of the winter wonderland of the World’s Fair proved as magical as I’d hoped, a spark in the audience and a spring in every company member’s step, as we’re transported not just back to pre-2020 Chicago, but a Windy City circa Christmas 1892. Yumi Kanazawa’s young Marie navigates the rat-infested streets beneath the grand Ferris Wheel and towering White City. Dylan Gutierrez’s Great Impresario — the Fair’s fictional architect — makes an appearance before arriving at the hovel Marie shares with her mother and brother in the shadow of the White City.

There, the spectacle begins with a holiday celebration, the Impresario delivering gifts (including the titular Nutcracker), children and the cast dancing, and members of the Lyric Opera Orchestra appearing onstage with violin, clarinet, and accordion as an in-house chamber trio. We’re treated to the comforts of this traditional holiday tale — a broken toy, a young girl’s dream, soldiers and mice battling, and finally a gondola to carry us to Act II.

During intermission, I was able to take in the refurbished building itself. My daughter noted that “it looks old, but new, too.” And, perhaps for the first time ever, I marveled at the lines for the bathroom and the bar, just soaking in the wonder of being part of a day at the theater.

After intermission, Act II brings a new wonderland, a new world — the White City of 1893 Chicago. Set to the Tchaikovsky’s festive second act score, the exotic sights and sounds of the World’s Fair enchant, as they did in previous versions, or as they did more than a century ago. Yoshihisa Arai’s hilarious Mother Nutcracker oversees the children’s ensemble playing hilarious cracking walnuts; Fernando Duarte’s Chinese Dancer parades along with paper dragons; Edson Barbosa’s rootin’, tootin’ Buffalo Bill Cody and his showgirls bring the fireworks. And, as in previous years, the highlight of the Fair’s attractions are the Arabian Dancers, here played by Victoria Jaiani and Temur Suluashvili. The only dancers almost as enchanting are Gutierrez’s Impresario and Jeraldine Mendoza, as the Queen of the Fair, who close out the show.

This presentation of the Joffrey Ballet’s Nutcracker has the same grace and beauty, the same spectacle, as one would have expected in previous years. But while the audience was treated to the same attention to perfection as audiences of the past enjoyed, a new home for the Joffrey and a new sense of appreciation for its continued excellence make this year’s Nutcracker a must-see.

Kids these days…

I went into opening night of Gift Theatre’s production of Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman only knowing that my 16-year-old daughter was excited to be my date. “It’s dark, Dad,” she warned me. Boy, was she right. “But it’s amazing, Dad,” she also assured me. And boy, was she even righter on that count.

So, dark and amazing. The Pillowman is both of these. But what is it?

A buddy cop piece. A murder mystery. The touching tale of two brothers, each all the other has in the world. A warning from some dystopian dictatorship. A volume of grim, gruesome fairy tales. The Pillowman is all of these things, and more. Much more.

I haven’t enjoyed a play this much since Goodman’s Jeff-winning 2018 production of The Wolves. And that’s because — along with McDonagh’s masterful book, Laura Alcala Baker’s visionary direction, and Lauren Nichols and Courtney Winkelman’s dark, stark scenery, of course — the four actors who tell The Pillowman’s story (and its stories within the story) give what’s a pretty soulless premise a whole lot of soul. The four-person cast is The Pillowman’s beating, battered, bleeding, bloody heart.

A word of warning. This play is dark. And shocking. And violent. It’s about child murders. And even worse, childhood trauma. But even more shocking is, coming from the mouths of a couple of the characters, a word I’d figured was too taboo to have to hear in today’s world. The R Word. Of course, its use speaks volumes about the characters who use it. Even as it’s used to describe Jay Worthington’s Michal, a developmentally disabled fellow. Worthington, to his credit, plays Michal with incredible restraint and empathy, never using the character’s condition and lot in life for laughs. Whether climbing the walls or crawling the floor, whether admitting to the unthinkable or revealing unthinkable trauma, Worthington’s Michal draws the eye whenever he’s onstage — an incredible character, but just as incredible a performance.

Michal’s brother Katurian, the play’s main character, is a storyteller and tells this story to us, the audience. Tucked away in some future police interrogation room for the duration of the play, Katurian begins the show with a bag over his head, as in the dark as his audience — us — is. Martel Mannin’s face and expressions do the same heavy lifting that Michal’s physicality do, manufacturing suspense, shock, and sorrow — a lifetime of sorrow. And, along with inventive ways of illustrating Katurian’s twisted children’s tales, Mannin’s face and voice keep the audience enraptured as he tells one story after another, each designed again to suspend belief, to shock sensibilities, and to create a world of sorrow.

In Katurian’s world, his cement holding cell, we also meet the two cops investigating a series of incidents seemingly copied straight from the pages of the fictional storyteller’s fictional stories. Gregory Fenner’s Ariel comes off at first as the prototype “bad cop” (I think one of the two even identifies him as such), threatening (and carrying out) acts of brutality, puffing on a vape, and stalking the concrete cube that is the play’s entire world. But look closer and it’s Fenner’s eyes that tell deeper stories that come to the fore as the play progresses. In Ariel’s eyes, ferocity morphs into fear.

But in a cast where each member could lay claim to being the MVP, my award goes to Cyd Blakewell. Her role, Detective Tupolski — it seems both from the play’s unchanged dialogue and a bit of internet perusing I did after the house lights came on — was written for a man. (Jeff Goldblum played the role in New York.) This is a physical (and violent) play, and Blakewell’s easy and subtle physicality looms throughout, even as others are applying electrodes and murdering children and climbing and crawling and crying and creating dark imaginary worlds, as she just pretends at being the “good cop.” (Full disclosure: when Blakewell first started her bit, my daughter turned to me and said, “It’s mom!” at the same time I turned to her and said “It’s your mom!” so maybe her performance hit close to home.) And it’s the story that Blakewell’s Tupolski tells near the end, using just a blackboard and a piece of white chalk, that was for me the best scene in a play full of contenders.

So if you’re up for a very dark evening of entertainment, you’ll be entertained. And if you can get past some pretty unsettling content in order to admire acting and storytelling at its finest, The Gift Theatre’s The Pillowman is for you, now through March 29.

So, I went into Once on This Island, currently playing at the Cadillac Palace Theatre, knowing nothing of the show at all. Nothing. The above title, I took that from one of the songs that’s still stuck in my head — “Some Girls,” sung beautifully in this production by Tyler Hardwick’s Daniel.

But it’s the sentiment of that song, that some girls (or some things, like Broadway musicals, perhaps) are extraordinary, special, better than the status quo. As this production began, I wouldn’t have guess that it would take its place in the really good shows I’ve seen, or the really good ones I’ve had the privilege to review. But you know what? By the end of the show, it had.

You see (and my 16-year-old daughter, a theater geek in her own right, agreed with me as soon as the houselights went on), this show’s a grower. Before it began, the set held promise — audience members seated on either side of the stage itself, various sand and detritus hinting at the Caribbean island setting to come, what seemed to be cast members milling about.

But, just as 2018’s Auditorium Theatre touring production of The Color Purple found a stripped-down production overwhelmed by a cavernous locale, this production at first seemed to be swallowed up by the size of the Cadillac. The set was spread out over the stage, sure, but the sound was muddled and devoured by the site. This problem seemed to get better as the show went on — I’m not sure if my ears just adjusted or if the cast did the adjusting.

Or maybe it’s that, as I said, the show’s a grower. Because the cast and the songs they sang seemed to get better as it went on. A show that had my daughter’s head nodding to stay awake at first later found it nodding along to the story and the tunes. This being a one-act performance, the lack of an intermission worked wonders, not allowing the booze-and-bathroom break to kill the slow-building momentum. And build it did.

The story’s your standard girl-meets-boy-but-stuff-gets-in-the-way sort of plot that Disney’s mined for decades. And this story would totally fit into the Disney Princess pantheon if Disney’s ever looking to head to the Caribbean for anything other than Johnny Depp in a pirate getup. Told as the story (to a young cast member and the audience members seated on the stage’s edges) of an orphaned and impoverished island girl (Ti Moune played by Courtnee Carter) who falls in love with a rich boy (the afore-mentioned Daniel, played by the talented Hardwick), the best parts go to the supernatural characters who populate the fairy tale.

Kyle Ramar Freeman lords over the stage whenever he’s on it as Asaka, Mother of the Earth. Jahmaul Bakare isn’t far behind with his water god. Just as the land of Oz’s Glinda is overshadowed by the cool costumes and witchcraft of her more wicked counterparts, Cassondra James’ love goddess Erzulie isn’t as much fun as the other deities, though James’ voice and presence make up for what her character lacks. But throughout the show, I was enchanted by the fourth god, Papa Ge, the demon of death. The actress who played Papa Ge was done up all ratty and punk-rock, but her physicality and beauty and presence were evident, not to mention her musical chops. Only afterward did I look in the playbill and learn that this Papa Ge’s played by Tamyra Gray, my all-time favorite television singing competition entrant (she was on the very first season of American Idol, back when Kelly Clarkson won, back before my teenage date for this show was even born). Needless to say, even if she’s playing a hellish harvester of souls, Tamyra’s still got my heart!

And, it seemed, by the end of the show, the cast and the story they told and the songs that they sang had won over the hearts of the audience, too. The songs had gotten better, the sound had settled down, and the actors and singers had warmed up and settled in, giving the Cadillac Palace’s audience a good time, which I’m sure they’ll keep on doing in this production Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty’s Once on This Island, playing now through February 2.