Word: urinetown
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Reddout demonstrates equal ability behind the scenes as well. She served as Music Director to the productions of “Jekyll & Hyde” and “Little Shop of Horrors.” She was also the Assistant Producer of “Urinetown (The Musical).” She is currently working on Sondheim’s “Into the Woods,” which she is directing...
...Grease and Bye Bye Birdie still top the schools' most-popular list (Little Shop of Horrors was actually No. 1 for 2007), a growing number of high schools are turning to more adventurous fare for their theatrical rite of spring: big, adult epics like Les Miz; irreverent satires like Urinetown; dark musicals like Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd. "There's a sense of we want to do something new and edgy," says Jeff Knoedler of Newton South High School outside Boston. "There's only so many times you can trot out Oklahoma! Our kids are doing musicals starting at camp...
...build stuff." Indeed, in sharp contrast to the cost-conscious commercial theater, high school directors seek out shows with the biggest casts possible. "You want as many opportunities for as many kids as you can have," says Christine Travalino, theater director at Pittsburgh Perry High School, which put on Urinetown this year. "A lot of the older shows just don't have enough parts in them." Letzter of West Aurora High says she's long wanted to do Into the Woods - Sondheim's dark twist on old fairy tales - but doesn't feel the cast is big enough. "No matter...
...Doing edgier shows can still get you into trouble with conservative school administrators or community groups. A high school in Stevens Point, Wis., had to cancel a planned production of Urinetown in 2006 when the school administrators decided it wasn't appropriate for kids. An Indianapolis high school production of Ragtime had to battle with local clergy, black leaders and school officials over the musical's use of racial epithets, sexual and religious references. Jesus Christ Superstar has drawn criticism from some religious groups. And when a private school in suburban Baltimore offered a unique racial twist on the casting...
...study guides; a production of Annie can help educate kids about the Depression and FDR's economic policies; Les Miz can be a window for a comparison of the revolutionaries of 19th century France with the Chinese students at Tiananmen Square. Travalino says her school's staging of Urinetown - about a future dystopia where citizens have to pay to pee - had an educational angle as well. "We have a student who started a recycling program," she says. "I thought, well, this show is perfect; it has to do with taking care of the environment and what can happen...