This Summer’s Musical Crop

This summer, I again saw two musicals at the Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts, Les Misérables and The Music Man. The former is my favorite musical of all time (as mentioned previously here), and the latter, as I’ve said recently, is the first musical I was exposed to and is a family favorite.  I was very excited to see both of these shows, but while The Music Man delivered, I was left feeling a bit shorted at Les Mis. Presented here are some thoughts about both shows.  I’ll work my way backwards since the people searching for reviews are likely to want them for the show that is actually still playing.

 

File Under “Confused”

“For you, that’s a menu.”

I still don’t know what she meant, the usher woman at PCPA.  I thought about it after she said it, during intermission, after the show, during the entire hour-plus ride home, and it even creeped into my head at particularly slow moments during the show.

Some context:  Today I saw The Music Man at PCPA Theatrefest in Santa Maria with my mother and her parents.  It is both my mom’s and my grandma’s favorite show, and it was the musical I “cut my teeth” on, so we were all very happy to see it.  It was, incidentally, an excellent performance, and a review is forthcoming.  More immediately interesting is this curious happening:  as we were shuffling through the tiny hallway into the theatre itself, the woman who was handing out programs with a “here you are, ma’am” and a “here you go” suddenly turned, handed me a program and quoted me this post’s anterior sentence.  Flustered, I continued my entry without a word, finally speaking in order to ask my mom if she knew what it meant, if it was some sort of thing that people say once they get older.

 

Three Musicals In Two Days

I recently discovered the Pacific Conservatory for the Performing Arts while listening to the radio on the way to work. When I found out that they were doing an extended run of Godspell, I hastily signed on, excited at the prospect of seeing the musical that Westmont’s CC’s cafe (the fundraiser event for the college choir) did incredibly well in early 2007. Some friends and I also bought tickets for Ragtime, which I had never seen before, and the timing worked out so that we saw Ragtime on Saturday the 12th, which happened to be its opening night, and I saw Godspell the next evening on my way to Fresno from Santa Barbara for my vacation. After the shows I can definitely say that I am very impressed with the professionalism and talent of PCPA.