Marc Robin News

Voting is NOW OPEN and the first votes are in for the 2019 BroadwayWorld Maine Awards, brought to you by TodayTix! The nominees are set, and now you can vote to make sure your favorite local theatres and performers are recognized!

Believe in magic this Holiday Season at the Fulton Theatre! Peter Pan flies in, November 14 through December 29, with previews November 12 & 13. An adventure for the entire family, Peter Pan is being produced on the grand scale of the Fulton's Beauty and the Beast.

The nationally regarded Fulton Theatre is proud to present, Wait Until Dark, October 10 through October 27, with previews October 8 and 9. A suspenseful Halloween treat for every thrill seeker!

Ramirez has an especially powerful belt, and conveys emotions of passion, anger, and frustration through song with great conviction (and volume).

Due to popular demand for its season opener, the nationally regarded Fulton Theatre is proud to extend Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's triumphant and beloved, Evita, through October 20. This show has tangoed its way into audience's hearts around the world for the past 41 years and continues to be relevant and impactful today.

The nationally regarded Fulton Theatre is proud to present Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's beloved, Evita, September 19 through October 13, with previews on September 17 and 18. This show has tangoed its way into audience's hearts around the world for the past 41 years and continues to be relevant and impactful today.

a?oeA very, very merry, merry, happy, happy endinga??.a?? sings the colorful cast of human beings and sea creatures as they celebrate the wedding of Prince Alexander and Melody in Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark's musical version of THE LITTLE MERMAID. And, indeed, this final 2019 Maine State Music Theatre production in the Pickard Theater proves to be just that! The third Theatre for Young Audiences show which closes another season of spectacular theatre for the Brunswick-based theatre is one of the most ambitious, completely realized productions created by MSMT's intern company.

BroadwayWorld presents a comprehensive weekly roundup of regional stories around our Broadway World, which include videos, editor spotlights, regional reviews and more. This week, we feature JOSEPH on Broadway, Lea Salonga in SWEENEY TODD, FROZEN Tour First Look and More!

a?oeFor nearly forty years this story has given faithful service to the Young in Heart; and Time has been powerless to put its kindly philosophy out of fashiona??..a?? These words from L. Frank Baum dance across the screen during the overture of MSMT's stunning new production of THE WIZARD OF OZ, reminding the audience of the perennial appeal of this beloved story. And as the curtain goes up, the audience is treated to arguably the largest, most lavish production in MSMT history with a cast of fifty (that includes twenty children and a dog), dazzling technical elements, staging and choreography to blow one away, and performances to melt the heart. a?oea??When I saw Marc Robin's production at the Fulton in 2016, I said, a?oeWe have to do this at MSMT. THE WIZARD OF OZ had not been on this stage since 1961, and it was time to give it a new life,a?? says Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark. Clark is one of the large panel, which also includes Marc Robin, Travis M. Grant, Carolyn Anne Miller, Susan Cella, Ian Knauer, and David Girolmo, who have come together in conversation with BWW's Maine Editor Carla Maria Verdino-Süllwold in MSMT and BWW's final season collaboration of PEEK BEHIND THE CURTAIN at the Curtis Memorial Library on August 14th.

To stage the beloved cultural icon that is THE WIZARD OF OZ offers any theatre company a herculean challenge: one which requires stretching the imagination to the limits to create a universe where reality is redefined and fantasy is fulfilled. In short, it demands stunning stagecraft and brilliant artistic vision. And it is just that kind of theatrical magic which Maine State Music Theatre's new production co- directed by Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark boldly and beautifully realizes.

a?oeIn the musical they all learn that the thing they believe is missing is already inside of them. We all have within us everything we think we are deficient in a?" everything we need to become the person we are supposed to be.a?? Actor David Girolmo is speaking of the lesson his character, the Cowardly Lion, learns in the stage version of L. Frank Baum's iconic classic THE WIZARD OF OZ, which runs from August 7-24 in a spectacularly fantastical production co-directed by narc Robin and Curt Dale Clark at Maine State Music Theatre.

When actress Carolyn Anne Miller utters that iconic line on the Pickard Stage next week a?" a?oeToto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore,a?? it will have an added resonance for the Midwestern native, who makes her Maine State Music debut in THE WIZARD OF OZ. The Chicago born and educated Miller cut her professional teeth at, among other theatres, Music Theatre Wichita, before moving to New York City and on to star as Dorothy in MSMT's fantastical new production of the stage version of that perennial classic based on L. Frank Baum's stories, directed and choreographed by Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark.

Do you live for the work of legendary songwriters such as Frank Loesser, Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway and the Gershwins?

"The main purpose of NAMT (National Alliance for Musical Theatre) is preservation of the art form. We are committed to keeping musical theatre moving forward and changing with the times. MSMT is a founding member of NAMT, and our decision to produce TREASURE ISLAND A MUSICAL ADVENTURE is our way of participating with new work." The speaker is Curt Dale Clark, MSMT's Artistic Director, who is part of a panel of cast members from the theatre's East Coast premiere of the new musical version of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, which is currently wowing audiences at the Pickard Theater in Brunswick. Clark, together with actors Aaron Ramey, James Patterson, Michael Iannucci, and Gabriel Rosario spoke with BROADWAY WORLD's Carla Maria Verdino-Sullwold on July 3rd in the second of MSMT's PEEK BEHIND THE CURTAIN program at Curtis Memorial Library.

There is magic afoot at MSMT's Pickard Theater - and miracles! Not supernatural ones, but rather those that happen when a fresh new work of musical theatre dazzles the public with its excitement and beauty. And that is exactly what Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark's TREASURE ISLAND A MUSICAL ADVENTURE does as its charts an epic and extraordinary course that gives MSMT audiences a production that is grand, genuinely thrilling, and emotionally satisfying in a timeless way. Robert Louis Stevenson's novel has been adapted for stage and screen numerous times, but none has been as compelling, as simultaneously classic and contemporary as this new musical version, which had its world premiere at the Fulton Theatre in 2018. This East Coast premiere of TREASURE ISLAND offers audiences an opulent production, a brilliant team of creatives, cast, and crew, who pour all their energies into crafting an adventure for the ages. Known for bringing 'Broadway to Brunswick,' with TREASURE ISLAND MSMT has produced a show that is worthy to inhabit any Broadway stage and to find a lasting place in the American musical repertoire.

"I would love to play an iconic adventure hero role, and this is a herculean moment for me that is incredibly gratifying. It is a beautiful story." Michael William Nigro is talking about playing the young hero of TREASURE ISLAND, Jim Hawkins, in the new musical version by Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark, which begins a run of its East Coast premiere at Maine State Music Theatre on June 26th. The twenty-year-old Nigro, who returns to the show after having made his debut in the Fulton Theatre's world premiere in September 2018, says that not only is TREASURE ISLAND a coming of age story for Jim Hawkins, but that he, himself, has "experienced moments of huge personal growth. The experience of the show has informed me so much in this last year. And now [returning to reprise the role], I get an opportunity to connect my own coming of age experience to the character - to bring what is so real to me into the role." Nigro's journey from the New Jersey suburb of Cranford to New York and regional stages as well as to television and film began, he recalls, at age three. "My Mom took me to see LES MISERABLES at the local high school. An actor named Jonathan Schwartz caught me attention. I was enamored of his work, and I followed his career as I grew up. He was the first person in the theatre whom I looked up to; I wanted to be like him. Fast forward to when I was fourteen and about to perform in THE SOUND OF MUSIC LIVE, I received a message from him as he was rehearsing ALADDIN on Broadway," he smiles, noting the serendipitous way lives intertwine in the theatre.

"I had been looking for a reason to come back, and do another show here, so I was pleased when my managers sent me to audition for TREASURE ISLAND [A MUSICAL ADVENTURE]. Doing new work is always great; I love that process where I get to be more involved in the actual creation." Broadway star Aaron Ramey is explaining how he has come to find himself back in Maine to play the plum role of Long John Silver in MSMT's East Coast premiere of Marc Robin and Curt Dale Clark's new epic musical which plays at the Pickard Theater from June 26 - July 13, 2019. Ramey had been an intern in 1997 while he was still a student at Otterbein University. "Ironically," he notes, "that was the summer of renovatios and MSMT performed at Crooker Auditorium, so this production will actually be my first time on the Pickard stage." He recalls the shows from that season: "I was in SWEENEY TODD, CAROUSEL, and TOMMY. I wasn't a good enough dancer to be in THE MUSIC MAN, but I did get to carry the pool table across stage, and in A CHORUS LINE, I played trombone in the pit," he laughs. "And then, too, I knew Michael Nigro [who plays Jim Hawkins] from a workshop we had both been in in New York, and he had urged me to audition."

"I did this show two decades ago with these amazing ladies, and when I asked them if they would be willing to reprise their performances. When they said 'yes,' I was thrilled to be able to bring this new production here to MSMT." Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark is speaking about Maine State Music Theatre's 2019 season opener, the dazzling Duke Ellington revue, SOPHISTICATED LADIES, and its co-stars E. Faye Butler and Felicia P. Fields, who are now playing at Brunswick's Pickard Theater. Butler, Fields, and Jessica A. Lawyer, one of the astounding dancers in the show, have joined Clark and BROADWAY WORLD'S Maine Editor, Carla Maria Verdino-Sullwold, on June 12 at Curtis Memorial Library to discuss the production at the opening panel discussion of the theatre's annual PEEK BEHIND THE CURTAIN series.

"It's the kind of music that makes you feel regal," actress Felicia P. Fields says, describing the genius of Duke Ellington. "The word 'sophistication' isn't used as much today as it was back then. There was an elegance in the period." Fields, who is one of the stars of Maine State Music Theatre's new production of SOPHISTICATED LADIES, which runs at the Pickard Theater from June 5-22, 2019, believes that the production, directed by Marc Robin with three individual choreographers and an eleven piece orchestra perfectly captures the 1920s and 1930s and the big-band era.

So what does a theatre company do to keep its momentum and even up the ante after a 60th anniversary season that broke all records? Why not hire three choreographers, fourteen virtuoso singer-dancers, and an eleven-piece big band orchestra, to mount the largest dance show in its history that celebrates the music of one of America's immortal musical geniuses, Duke Ellington? That is precisely what Maine State Music Theatre has done in its 2019 season opener with its sensational all-singing, all-dancing, visually opulent extravaganza, SOPHISTICATED LADIES, that is currently blowing the roof off the Pickard with its high-octane visceral energy, heady joy, and pure lyrical magic.