Skip to main content

THE HEIGHTS PLAYERS TAKE IT TO THE HEIGHTS!

NOTHING BUT THE HITS  Part 2  was nothing but the BEST! 







The Heights Players, Brooklyn’s oldest self-sustaining community theater, has done it again! 

For their Gala ending their 59th year, they selected some three dozen of American musical theater’s greatest hits for performances on June 10-12. 

The singing was pitch perfect and the tap dancing  tiptop as  two dozen Heights Players danced and sang through decades of songs. 

Under the direction of Thomas Tyler and Ed Healy,  the show moved  quickly  from one production number to the next.  Cast members shined in a fabulous progression through the show with Musumi Iwai adding some  delightful surprise acrobatics to her ballet number.

Stand outs  include the choreography of Aurora Dreger,  the song stylings of newcomer Jonathan Merechant,  and the superb vocals of Rachel Coffin and Ivis Fundichely

David Fletcher’s  musical arrangements —from “There’s No Business like Show Business’ to the finale of “Yesterday,”  “Today” and “Tomorrow” — sewed together seamlessly the ageless spirit of love and hope that these songs shared.

 What a treat it was later that night of June 12 to see the Tony awards—it’s only 30 minutes away from Brooklyn to Broadway— to remember that I had heard many of these songs just that afternoon on Willow Street.

While The Heights Players might not be winning Tony Awards,  they win the hearts of musical lovers in spirited, highly professional and LIVE performance.  


WANT TO GO:
WHAT: 2015-16 SEASON
WHERE:  26 Willow Place, Brooklyn Heights, NY 11201  - phone 718-237-2752
WEB SITE: http://www.heightsplayers.org

CREDITS FOR THE GALA
Ed Healy, Michael Blake, James Martinelli, Mykel Frank, Jonathan Merechant, Sean Dearing, Maureen Vidal, Faith Elliott, Dana DiAngelo, Michelle Maccarone, Masumi Iwai, Aurora Dreger, Cait Farrell, Maria Elisa Costa, and Isabella Prince. Veterans: Bill Wood, Jim McNulty. Ivis Fundichely, Cathy Lemmon, and Lacey Friedman.  First timers: Rantea Thompson and Rachel Coffin.

The production coordinated, written and directed by Thomas N. Tyler. 
 Musical director: David Fletcher, with percussionist Daryl Cozzi.  
 Direction: Ed Healy 
Choreography: Sean Dearing, Aurora Dreger and Cait Farrell. 
Production Stage Manager: Marialana Ardolino 
Lighting designer:  Leo J. Contrino 
Event coordinator: Corrine Contrino, with  Jill Lewis-Kelly and Jan VanderPutten.




Popular posts from this blog

  Once is here again!   The Brooklyn Gallery Players reach into the treasure chest of great musicals to bring Once alive and on stage in Brooklyn (until to December 17, 2023). Director Mark Gallagher , and Music Directors David Fletcher and Brendon McCray have crafted a vibrant production, seamlessly integrating the 15 member cast in roles  as both actors and musicians. Set in Dublin, the  formula for the poignant love triangle  is simple. Patrick Newhart  plays Guy, an Irish musician who has given up  on love as he sings the award winning classic  Falling.  Newhart mastered the bombastic busking guitar style and performed each of his songs with intensity and passion Sophie Smith-Brody  is Girl,  a Czech woman  who will inspire him to try again both in  love and with music. Smith-Brody performed each of her disparate songs with aplomb,  from the opening classical piece to her plaintive solos – If You Want Me and The Hill.  The performance starts  with an “ impromptu”  p
               TINA - THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL  at The National Theatre              In the 1970s, I  had spent weeks climbing around ruins in Peru.  I heard music of the Andes all over.  I  was  finally at  Machu Picchu to spend the night so I could get up early  and climb to see the sunrise from the top of the ruins.   As I got to steps by the gatekeepe,  I could hear his boom box blaring across the Andes “I Wanna Take You Higher”  by Tina Turner.   You don’t have to go climbing the Andes to hear her songs — Tina-The Tina Turner Musical  isright here  at the National Theatre, Washington DC,  until  Oct. 23, 2022.    The show has broken all records with the awards it has received since in premiered in April 2018 in London.  No one questions that Tina is a musical legend but  for this show  accolades to  the stars Naomi Rodgers and Zurin Villanueva who alternate in the  spectacular role.   At every performance there will be people  who remember seeing Tina “back when” and
  Sarah Ruhl’s Orlando — sparkling wit and ageless wisdom —   at   Constellation Theatre — gone but not forgotten In Virginia Woolf’s Orlando A Biography ,  the eponymous hero undergoes many changes over the centuries— from roles in society and relationships to sex change.  Since the time travel gender bending work was published in 1928, this his/her story has continued to undergone adaptions to its original form, from analytical scholarly critiques to crowd pleasing  movies and stage plays.  Constellation Theatre Company continued  the tradition with its amazing presentation of Sarah Ruhl’s narrative play Orlando .    Five actors  take on dozens of roles as characters or in the  chorus to keep the story at its rapid pace,  condensing events spanning almost five centuries into 100 minutes.   Orlando (Mary Myers) is  ever the aristocrat whether as a page in the court of  Queen Elizabeth I (Alan Naylor)  or involved with a mysterious Russian princess (Edmee - Marie Faal) or pursued