It's a race against time across the Nazi-occupied French
countryside. To escape, a humble young Jew fleeing for his life must
suddenly join forces with an anti-Semitic Polish officer smuggling
secret papers to England. Come share this odd couple's harrowing yet
grand adventures, told through Jerry Herman's rousing music and lyrics.
Experience the truths they discover about courage, survival, and the
meaning of friendship.
Comments Colony Artistic Director Barbara Beckley: "It is unreal to
me that we are in the unbelievably wonderful position to bring our
subscribers and audiences a world premiere revision of a Jerry Herman
musical. Jerry and Mark refer to THE GRAND TOUR
as 'the show we loved and lost,' and they're both so excited to be
re-visiting this amazing piece of work. To have their input and launch
it on our stage is a dream come true for any theatre. To be working
with Evan Weinstein again who directed one of our most successful
musicals in Candide, to have Jason Graae back on our stage again with
the rest of this extraordinary cast is absolutely thrilling."
EVAN WEINSTEIN (Director)
returns to the Colony for the first time since directing the
award-winning production of Candide. Though theatre is Evan's first
love, he spends most of his time working in television. He is currently
Co-Executive Producer of the CBS reality series, "The Amazing Race,"
for which he has won three Emmy Awards and a Producer's Guild Award.
Other TV credits include producing, directing and/or writing for
the following shows: "Paradise Hotel" (FOX); "Profiles From The Front
Line," "Before They Were Stars," "Kids Are Funny" and "America's
Funniest People" (ABC); "Wild Things," "Extra" and "The Suzanne Somers
Show" (syndicated); A&E's "Top Ten" (A&E Network); "The Most"
and "The Apostle Paul" (The History Channel); "Heroes For The Planet"
(National Geographic Channel). Before getting into television, and
sporadically since, Evan has had the opportunity to direct plays and
musicals. Credits include: The Fantasticks, Wait Until Dark, Bitter
Friends with Shelly Berman, A Kidnapped Santa Clause with Lauren Tewes
and Vic Taybak, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Torch Song Trilogy,
Seduction Duet, Vanities, Flashback & Johnny Moonbeam (TYA Tours
for Syracuse Stage), and the original workshops and readings of Aaron
Sorkin's Removing All Doubt. Evan received a Diploma of Music from New
York's "famed" High School of Performing Arts and a BFA in Theatre from
Syracuse University. He returned to Syracuse last May to deliver the
keynote address to 6,000parents and graduating seniors from the University's College of Visual & Performing Arts.
JERRY HERMAN
(Composer/Lyricist) There is never an evening when, somewhere in the
world, the music and lyrics of Jerry Herman are not being sung by a
lady in a red headdress, or a lady with a bugle, or a middle-aged man
in a wig and a boa. Hello, Dolly!, Mame, and La Cage are home to some
of the most popular, most-often performed and most successful musical
heroines of all time, and have given Jerry the distinction of being the
only composer-lyricist in history to have had three musicals that ran
more than 1,500 consecutive performances on Broadway. His first
Broadway show was Milk and Honey (1961), followed by Hello, Dolly!
(1964) Mame (1966) Dear World (1969), Mack & Mabel (1974) The Grand
Tour (1979), La Cage (1983), Jerry's Girls (1985) and "Mrs. Santa
Claus" (1966), a CBS TV special starring Angela Lansbury. Showtune, a
revue of his life's work, is performing in regional theatres around the
country. His string of awards and honors includes Tonys, Grammys, Drama
Desk Awards, the Johnny Mercer Award, the Richard Rodgers Award, the
Oscar Hammerstein Award, the Frederick Lowe Award, the Songwriters Hall
of Fame and the Theatre Hall of Fame.
MICHAEL STEWART (Book)
scored on Broadway the first time out when he won a Tony for his Bye
Bye Birdie libretto. Subsequently he was the librettist for Carnival,
for which he won the Drama Critics Circle Award, and Hello , Dolly!,
which won him both the Tony and the Drama Critics prize. He also wrote
the books for George M!, Mack and Mabel, Harrigan and Hart and
co-authored 42nd Street and The Grand Tour. He wrote the book and
lyrics for I Love My Wife and the lyrics for Barnum. Mr. Stewart died
in 1987.
MARK BRAMBLE (Book) began
his theatrical career working for David Merrick on many Broadway
productions. As author, his shows include Barnum with songs by Cy
Coleman and Michael Stewart (ten Tony Award nominations including Best
Book and Best Musical, Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Musical),
42nd Street with songs by Harry Warren and Al Dubin (Tony Award for
Best Musical, Laurence Olivier Award for Musical of The Year, Evening
Standard Drama Award for Best Musical, Plays and Player Citation For
Musical Of The Year, etc.), The Three Musketeers with the music of
Rudolph Friml, many collaborations with Michael Stewart including The
Grand Tour, Treasure Island with songs by Jule Styne, and the off
Broadway opera Elizabeth & Essex. At the Haymarket Theatre, in
Leicester, England, Mr. Bramble and Henry Krieger created Fat Pig, a
rock and roll extravaganza about health. He also adapted and staged
Notre Dame, a musical based on Victor Hugo's novel at Saddler's Wells,
London, and in Oxford. His radio musical In With the Old was produced
as a Christmas Day special on BBC Radio, with an all-star cast. He
directed the Tony Award winning revival of 42nd Street.
JEFF RIZZO (Musical
Director/New Arrangements) is pleased to be at the Colony again after
conducting last year's Grand Hotel. He musically directed Madison
Square Garden's The Wizard of Oz starring Roseanne, the national tour,
and the Grammy nominated cast recording starring Mickey Rooney and
Eartha Kitt. He was associate conductor of the US premiere of Sunset
Boulevard starring Glenn Close at the Shubert Theatre and conductor of
the fourth national tour of Annie. Pleased to be working again with
Mark Bramble, who co-wrote and directed the recent revival of 42nd
Street, Jeff conducted the national tour, playing the Ahmanson Theatre
in 2003. Recently, he has been audition accompanist for the upcoming
film of "Dreamgirls". Jeff has done countless shows, working for most
of the major regional musical theater companies, throughout the
country. As a composer his work includes the scores for Jailbirds on
Broadway, Wanna Play?!, and a new musical version of A Christmas
Carol.. With partner Eric Andrist, he co-founded the Musical Theatre
Guild.
Award-winning Choreographer PEGGY HICKEY
has collaborated with such renowned artists as Plácido Domingo,
Samuel Ramey, Denyce Graves, Susan Graham, Jonathan Kent, and Franco
Zeffirelli. Internationally, Peggy has choreographed La Cenerentola for
the Hong Kong Arts Festival, Salome for the Savonlinna Opera Festival
in Finland, and a long-running production of Fiddler on the Roof in
Mexcio City. Her production of Hansel und Gretel at the Juilliard
School was televised on PBS' Live From Lincoln Center and her
choreography for Washington Opera's Die Fledermaus (with Plácido
Domingo) was broadcast on PBS' Great Performances' Live from the
Kennedy Center.
Other
U.S. credits include La Traviata at Palm Beach Opera; La Rondine and
The Most Happy Fella (February 2006) for New York City Opera; La
Bohème, Aida, Falstaff, and Vanessa for Los Angeles Opera; Die
Fledermaus for San Diego Opera; Lucillo Silla at Santa Fe Opera, and
The Merry Widow for Houston Grand Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago.
In
film and television, Peggy was awarded the MTV Video Music Award for
Best Choreography for her work on Beck's The New Pollution; nominated
for a MTV Movie Award for Best Dance Sequence in a Feature Film for her
work on The Brady Bunch Movie, and nominated for an American
Choreography Award for her hilarious, tongue-in-cheek, "I Ain't Sorry"
for NBC's Passions. The episode also won 2 Emmy Awards. She
choreographed the highly successful "Nurses' Ball" for eight
consecutive years on ABC's General Hospital and Port Charles, and
recently completed choreographing "Bonnie's Cowboy Fantasy" for Days of
Our Lives. A two-time recipient of the Connecticut Critics Circle Award
for Outstanding Choreography for Brigadoon and On the Twentieth Century
at Goodspeed Musicals, Peggy also choreographed Amour, The King of
Hearts and A Little Night Music for Goodspeed, which garnered her yet
another nomination for the Connecticut Critics' Circle Award. A few of
her other regional credits include Gigi for Music Theatre West (L.A.
Dramalogue Award); The King and I at Casa Manana; My Fair Lady and
Carousel for Sacramento Music Circus; and State Fair for Music Theatre
of Wichita. Peggy received the Independent Reviewers of New England's
Award for Choreography for the Reagle Players' production of Singin' in
The Rain in Massachusetts.
The cast of THE GRAND TOUR
includes: Jason Graae, who returns to the Colony as Jacobowsky, after
appearing most recently as Otto Kringelein in Grand Hotel; Tami Tappan
Damiano will star as Marianne , John Ganun will star as the Colonel and
the cast will also feature Cynthia Beckert, Robyn Cohen, Michael
Dotson, Gordon Goodman, Marsha Kramer, Peter Musante and John Racca,.
THE GRAND TOUR has assembled
an award-winning design team. The set design is by Bradley Kaye (The
Laramie Project, Side Show). The costume design is by Jeffrey
Schoenberg (The Ladies of the Camellias, Side Show). The sound design
is by Drew Dalzell (Grand Hotel, Around the World in 80 Days). The
lighting design is by Don Guy (Grand Hotel).
THE GRAND TOUR will open on
Saturday, November 5 and perform through Sunday, December 4, 2005.
Performances for THE GRAND TOUR will be Fridays and Saturdays at
8:00pm, and Sundays at 2:00pm and 7:00pm. Additionally there will be
performances on Saturday, November 12 and Saturday, November 19 at
3:00pm; and also Wednesday, November 23 and Thursday, December 1 at
8:00pm. There will be no 7:00pm performance on Sunday, November 6.
Ticket prices range from $43.00 - $48.00 (student, senior and group
discounts are available). Preview performances will be Wednesday,
November 2, Thursday, November 3 and Friday, November 4 at 8:00pm -
tickets are $20.00 and $25.00. Opening night performance with reception
tickets are $50.00 and $55.00. There will be two Talk-Back performances
with the cast on Friday, November 11 and Wednesday, November 23
immediately following the performance. For tickets, call the Colony
Theatre Box Office at 818/558-7000 ext. 15.