Muhlenberg College Presents OKLAHOMA!
Soaring melodies fill the western skies in this loving celebration of the American spirit.Thursday, October 9, 2008 11:22 AM
As the Broadway musical that began the legendary partnership of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II in 1943, Oklahoma! was named the “Best Musical of the Century” by New York Drama League; and the show continues to be as entertaining to audiences in the 21st century. Performances are Friday, October 24 and Saturday, October 25 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, October 26 at 2 p.m.; and Wednesday, October 29 through Saturday, November 1 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, November 2 at 2 p.m. Tickets for adults and seniors are $20; tickets for youth under 17 are $8. Tickets are available by calling the box office at 484.664.3333 or visiting www.muhlenberg.edu/tickets on the web.
Oklahoma! launched a new era in the American musical. It also began the most successful songwriting partnership in Broadway history. In 1942 Richard Rodgers & Lorenz Hart were writing musical comedies universally praised for their wit, sophistication and innovation; Oscar Hammerstein II was revered for having written operettas that consistently challenged and reshaped the art form before heading to Hollywood to write film scores. They began their historic partnership in 1943 by collaborating on Lynn Riggs' folk play of life in his native Oklahoma, Green Grow the Lilacs. Aided by the brilliant choreography of Agnes de Mille, their “musical play” telling a simple tale of cowhands and farmers finding love and community in the Oklahoma territory caught the imagination and patriotic passion of wartime America; and the show went on to play for more than 2,000 performances on Broadway. (Copyright © 2008 The Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization. All rights reserved. http://www.rnh.com )
Landmark Musical of the American Broadway Stage
The Muhlenberg production of this landmark musical will be lavishly mounted with full professional orchestra and the original, lush orchestrations of Russell Bennett, who was recently awarded a 2008 Tony posthumously in recognition of his historic contribution to American musical theatre. As Broadway’s leading orchestrator, he worked with Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, Frederick Loewe and others on more than 300 shows between 1920 and 1975, according to NAXOS, the Classical music Label (http://www.naxos.com/composerlist/). Charles Richter, the Director of Theatre at Muhlenberg College, is directing the 40-plus cast in the acoustically resonant Empie Theatre and they will perform without the use of microphone amplification. Musical director is Ken Butler, who is a frequent collaborator with Richter and choreographer Karen Dearborn for the Department of Theatre & Dance. Dearborn describes her approach to the musical as both “familiar and new,” honoring the storytelling technique that Agnes DeMille brought to the Broadway stage but creating original movement for this production.
As the first Broadway musical with an integrated musical theatre form – music, dance and story – Oklahoma! is a creative testament to Rodgers and Hammerstein’s approach to the physical, emotional and psychological world of the characters in the Riggs’ play. Riggs, who was part Cherokee and a pioneer in writing to preserve western cultural history, had written folk and cowboy songs into the story of the early settlers of the Oklahoma Territory. Despite the romantic charm of cowboys Curly and Will, the story also includes the shifting tensions among farmers and cowboys over fences and water rights. Each of the spirited cowboys is in love with a farm girl – Curly with Laurey, and Will with Ado Annie. While Laurey is destined to fall in love with Curly, she is reluctant to make her feelings known. A rivalry ensues between Curly and the outsider, Jud, who desperately wants to court Laurey, as well. And while Will is delirious to marry the passionate Ado Annie, she is enamored of a traveling salesman who has no interest in settling down.
According to composer Richard Rodgers, he and lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II spent weeks examining the play before they began to put text and melodies on the page. Respecting the mood set by the stage description opening the play, the musical opens on a “radiant summer morning” as a solitary woman sits churning butter and a cowboy sings off in the distance. Perhaps the greatest appeal for audiences, even now, is that opening sense of anticipation; the lyrical “bright golden haze on the meadow” that the score invites us to examine, knowing that history will soon take this “loveliness” from us. It is not unlike the feeling that Americans have now, or have frequently had at times of great chaos and change when we are asked to relinquish what is familiar and embrace what is unpredictable.
Remarkably, Oklahoma! sends us willingly into the lives of these characters by exposing them both emotionally and psychologically. “Songs flow organically out of the action,” says Richter, “and dramatic scenes are amplified by the songs and the dances.” The most dramatic insight of character in the play is experienced through Laurey’s dream of marrying Curly, which turns into a nightmare as Jud appears and she cannot escape him. Staged as a ballet, the dream exposes Laurey’s confusion over feelings for Curly and her fear of Jud; the emotionally charged dream sequence reveals both the romantic conflict and the sense of danger that will change the lives of all three characters in the second act. The rivalry of Curly and Jud turns darker even as the matching of Will and Ado Annie is happily resolved during the famous bidding for box lunches made by each of the young women. While Curly wins Laurey and their marriage is celebrated by cowboys and farmers alike, Jud comes to an uncharacteristically dark end in this musical.
The Muhlenberg College theatre program is now ranked #6 in the nation by The Princeton Review. As the directors of the theatre and dance programs, Richter and Dearborn also staged the groundbreaking musical Oklahoma! in the Empie Theatre in 1995. “We are proud to have the actors, dancers and musicians to support the full original score, including the dance music uncut,” says Dearborn. And Richter is equally proud to boast a fully acoustic production of the musical: “Muhlenberg patrons who come to this production will know how Oklahoma!was really intended to sound to its Broadway audiences.”
Featured Muhlenberg Actors
Colin Hooker-Haring (Curly) performed most recently on Muhlenberg stages as Robin Oakapple in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Ruddigore and as the Lover in the Summer Music Theatre production of The Who’s Tommy. An Allentown native, he has also been seen locally as Tympani in Angel City, Marius in Les Miserables, the Beast in Beauty and the Beast, and Bill Sykes in Oliver. Christa Wroblewski (Laurey) was a 2007 regional semi-finalist in the Irene Ryan Acting competitions for the American College Theatre Festival; she has been featured in Muhlenberg Theatre Association productions as Hanako in The Pillow of Kantan, Tilly in Weldon Rising, Darlene in Monkey in the Middle, and Dawn in Three More Sleepless Nights. She also attended the Pennsylvania Governor’s School of the Arts and played Juliet in Gaslight Theatre Company’s production of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Julie.
Mike Miller (Will Parker) has performed in the ensembles of many Muhlenberg Theatre Association musicals, including Urinetown, Pillow of Kantan and Cabaret, as well as SMT’s Carousel and Fiddler on the Roof. Mike also danced in Charles O. Anderson’s evidence of things (un)said at the American College Dance Festival Nationals in New York City. Dana Lynn Parisi (Ado Annie) performed as Candi in Zanna, Don’t; Ivy in Serpentine (for which she was the winner of the American College Theatre Festival Ensemble Acting Award and was nominated for the national competition), Pvt. Mary Beth Burns in Monkey in the Middle, and in Urinetown. James Ludlum (Jud Fry) has performed in MTA productions of Cabaret, Life’s a Dream, Big Love, Ruddigore and Love’s Labor’s Lost as well as in the SMT productions of Carousel, Fiddler on the Roof, and Kiss Me, Kate. James is an actor combatant within the Society of American Fight Directors and has served as Assistant Fight Director to Michael Chin.
