RSO’s ‘DARLING’ WILL BE RECORDED FEATURING ‘HAMILTON’ ACTOR

September 4, 2016

Hamilton’s Nicholas Christopher will play Peter in a concert presentation of Darling, Ryan Scott Oliver’s dark deconstruction of Peter Pan, September 19 at 7 PM and 9:30 PM at Le Poisson Rouge in New York.

Darling will be the first musical recorded for The Score, a podcast series focused on new musicals.

The evening will also include the talents of Kerstin Anderson (Maria in the latest Sound of Music tour) as the eponymous heroine, with Ethan Carlson (Rope), Chris D’Amico (History Boys), Jeff Heimbrock (Book of Mormon), John-Michael Lyles (Jasper in Deadland), Jackson Perrin (NYMF’s Ludo’s Broken Bride), Daniel Quadrino (Wicked) and Daniel Yearwood (Lincoln Center’s American Songbook Series) as the Lost Boys. Talya Groves (Motown), Gerianne Perez (Vocalosity, NYMF’s Fable), Catherine Ricafort (Holiday Inn, Allegiance) and Emily Rogers (If/Then) will play Lily’s Dolls; P.J. Griffith (Giant) will be featured as The Captain and other roles.

Darling features a book, music and lyrics by Oliver and was conceived by Brett Ryback. The musical, according to press notes, tells the story of “a nameless girl called Darling who is rescued from an asylum for ‘troubled youngsters’ by the provocative rent-boy Peter. The young man steals her to the Second Slum, a seedy underground of jazz, sex, and a mysterious white powder called Dust.”

The concert evening will feature musical direction by Rodney Bush and a seven-piece orchestra. Orchestrations are by Oliver, with additional orchestrations by Solomon Hoffman and Ryan Fielding Garrett. Fernanda Douglas serves as music assistant.

The Score is a new podcast series created and produced by Michael Kimmel, John DeLore and Allison Bressi.

Darling is produced by WalkRunFly.

Le Poisson Rouge is located at 158 Bleecker Street, New York. Click here for tickets to the 7 PM performance; click here for the 9:30 PM show.

MENDEZ AND RSO ARE THE ‘MUSE AND THE MUSIC’ AT SUBCULTURE, AUG. 29

August 23, 2016

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Broadway star and Drama Desk nominated actress Lindsay Mendez will join musical forces with multi-award-winning composer Ryan Scott Oliver as the MUSE AND THE MUSIC, an evening of Oliver’s songs performed by them both at SubCulture.  Doors open at 7pm and show is at 8pm.

The performance promises some of their popular collaborations together, some never-before-heard songs, plus mash-ups, stories, and maybe even a little gossip.

The evening will be music directed by Rodney Bush and will feature a six-piece band.

Lindsay Mendez was most recently seen in the recent revival of Tennessee Williams’s The Rose Tattoo at Williamstown Theater Festival. Last year, she starred Off-Broadway in Roundabout Theatre Company’s World premiere production of Significant Other. On Broadway, she starred as Elphaba in the smash hit, Wicked. Her time there included performances on The Today Show and The Katie Couric Show, in celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the production. She received a Drama Desk Nomination, Outer Critics Circle Nomination, and a Drama League nomination for Outstanding Actress in a Musical for her performance as Rose Fenny in the Off-Broadway musical Dogfight.

Lindsay was one of the stars of the Broadway Revival of Godspell at the Circle in the Square Theatre. In 2010, she was seen on Broadway as a Mennonette to Sherie Rene Scott in Roundabout’s Tony-nominated production of Everyday Rapture. She made her Broadway debut as Jan in the 2007 revival of Grease, directed by Kathleen Marshall.

Off-Broadway, she has appeared in Dogfight (2nd Stage), Everyday Rapture (2nd Stage), and The Marvelous Wonderettes (West Side Theatre). Other favorite credits include: The Winter’s Tale (Shakespeare in the Park, Delacorte), 21 Chump Street as part of This American Life LIVE (BAM), Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris (TRTC), and 35MM (Urban Stages, directed by Daisy Prince.) Lindsay has a jazz/contemporary music group with pianist Marco Paguia (www.LMandMP.com). In the spring of 2013, they made their Lincoln Center debut with the American Songbook Series. Their debut album, This Time, is available on their website, and on iTunes. @lindsaymendez

Ryan Scott Oliver was called “the future of Broadway… a major new voice in musical theatre” (Entertainment Weekly) and is “shaking up musical theater with his dark, twisted and genius work … [Oliver] could very well be musical theater’s answer to an auteur filmmaker or a gothic novelist” (Huffington Post). He is the winner of a Larson Grant, Rodgers Award, Lortel Award Nomination, ASCAP Harold Adamson Award, New Musicals Awards from Weston Playhouse, Pace University and more.

He wrote the music and lyrics for Jasper in Deadland (premiered off-Broadway and remounted at Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre), 35mm: A Musical Exhibition (licensed by Samuel French, original cast recording avail. on Ghostlight Records), Darling, Mrs. Sharp, Out of My Head (licensed through Steele Spring Stage Rights), as well as the commission We Foxes (Broadway Across America) among others. He was selected to open Lincoln Center’s 2016 American Songbook series. He is currently at work on the new musical Rope, a commission for Grove Entertainment.

More info can be found at ryanscottoliver.com, and his morbidly optimistic musings can be followed at @ryanscottoliver.

Tickets are $25 and there is no food and drink minimum (alcohol and other drinks are for sale at the SubCulture bar).

SubCulture is located at 45 Bleecker Street New York, NY 10012.  Tickets may be purchased here.

‘WE FOXES’ to be performed at Village Theatre’s Festival of New Musicals

July 11, 2016

This year, We Foxes by Ryan Scott Oliver will be among the five new musicals brought to life at the Village Theatre‘s Festival of New Musicals.  Through the creative collaboration of nearly 75 artists and writers, performed and directed by the region’s foremost theatre professionals and guest artists from across the country, it will be the first Festival of New Musicals led by newly appointed Associate Artistic Director Brandon Ivie.

The Festival of New Musicals provides an essential platform for writers to incorporate a key component of Live Theatre: the audience. Each new musical will be rehearsed throughout the week, then presented to the Festival’s audience in staged reading format, fully sung using scripts. Though readings are not open to the general public, audiences are partly comprised of Village Originals members who are asked to participate in moderated talkbacks and provide written feedback and constructive critiques of the work, thereby becoming an integral part of the developmental process.

Village Theatre will welcome to Issaquah the critically-acclaimed musical theatre writers at the helm of the new works, who will convene from across the country for the three-day event. “I’m so pleased with the five shows we will have in residence for the festival,” says Festival Producer and Associate Artistic Director Brandon Ivie. “While all are at different stages in their development and vastly varied in style, these writers are all incredibly sophisticated with exceedingly unique voices, and are an inspiring testament to the future of the American Musical.”

RSO’s WE FOXES takes place in the small town of Havoc, Missouri at the onset of World War II.  A tough, unmannered orphan girl is plucked up from her vagabond life and adopted into a world of style and social graces by the beloved wife of the local sheriff. But in her new, unfamiliar life, she begins to discover that there are sinister secrets beneath the shiny veneer of this small town. Her adopted mother is not who she seems to be, and people are lurking in the dark. This gothic musical thriller follows one girl’s struggle to summon courage and survive at all costs.

Other new musicals of the festival include COSTS OF LIVING (Book, Music, and Lyrics by Timothy Huang), HOW TO BREAK (Book and Lyrics by Aaron Gaffers), STRING (Book by Sarah Hammond, Music and Lyrics by Adam Gwon), WRITING Kevin Taylor (Music and Lyrics by Will Van Dyke, Book and Lyrics by Josh Halloway).

‘JASPER IN DEADLAND’ TO BE RECORDED THIS DECEMBER; CONCERT RELEASE FEB. 12

November 29, 2015

RSO’s ‘Jasper in Deadland’ (with a book by Hunter Foster) will be recorded on cast album and distributed by Sh-K-Boom Records, which also distributed his ’35mm: A Musical Exhibition.’

MATT DOYLE as the title character, with SYDNEY SHEPHERD, LOUIS HOBSON, ANDI ALHADEFF,  BRANDI MASSEY, BONNIE MILLIGAN, F. MICHAEL HAYNIE, JOHN-MICHAEL LYLES and KYLE CARTER will be featured as the nine-person cast on the album.

The album is produced by Oliver and John Clancy (orchestrator), with Nessie Nankivell, Kailey Marshall and Solomon Hoffman as associate producers.

The album is scheduled to be released on February 12, 2016, kicking off with a concert at 54 Below.  On Cyber Monday (Nov. 30), prospective buyers can get 50% off seats for the concert!  CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS.

Jasper in Deadland was developed as a commission for the Pasadena Musical Theatre Program in 2011. Prospect Theater Company presented the New York City premiere, which featured Matt Doyle (The Book of Mormon) as Jasper, Allison Scagliotti (Off-Broadway debut, SyFy’s “Warehouse 13”) as Gretchen and Ben Crawford (Big Fish, Shrek The Musical) as Mr. Lethe. Performances ran through April 13 at the West End Theatre in the Church of St. Paul and St. Andrew. In May of 2015, Jasper in Deadland opened at Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre. Said David Armstrong, 5th Avenue Theatre’s Executive Producer and Artistic Director, “Ryan Scott Oliver and Hunter Foster are two of the most exciting young talents working in the theatre today and The 5th has a very successful track record in providing emerging theatre artists like these with a large scale playing field in which they can thrill and amaze us. What Rent is to La Bohème, this show is to the Orpheus myths and legends.”

Jasper in Deadland tells the story of 16-year-old Jasper, who journeys into the Afterlife to rescue his recently deceased best friend, Agnes.  But in this version of the hereafter – known as “Deadland,”  a hybrid of mythology, religion, and superstition – the dead forget Life…  And so, too, will Jasper, if he can’t get past the seven circles of Deadland, fearsome Cerberus, heavenly Beatrix, mysterious Mr. Lethe, and ultimately himself.  Can Jasper bring his best friend back from the dead, or will he join the dead forever?

The cast album is made possible by a generous contribution from Kenny and Marleen Alhadeff. If you are interested in joining the producing team as an investor, contact RSO at [email protected].

Matt Doyle as Jasper, Prospect Theater Company

RSO JOINS LINCOLN CENTER’S ‘AMERICAN SONGBOOK’ – BE SURE TO VOTE!

November 18, 2015

An evening of RSO’s work will be presented by an all-star Broadway cast as part of the Lincoln Center’s American Songbook series, “Prudential Invest in the Future of American Song.” When’s the show?  That’s up to you!

Follow this link to vote for RSO as your favorite… the winner of the three artists will get the coveted “opening night” spot on January 19th.  Be a part of #teamRSO, and vote today!

voteRSOVOTE HERE

Returning for its 17th season, Lincoln Center’s acclaimed series American Songbook will continue to broaden its scope in celebrating the best in American singing and songwriting as interpreted by top performers and rising stars, with events at three Lincoln Center venues. The series will expand to Mesa Arts Center, in Mesa, Arizona, with three performances in March. And for the third time, American Songbook will partner with Prudential Investment Management for an online program, Invest in the Future of American Song, through which the audience selects the performer to open the American Songbook season at the David Rubenstein Atrium.

For the third season, American Songbook will partner with Prudential Investment Management with Invest in the Future of American Song, an online competition through which the public chooses a performer for a free American Songbook concert at the David Rubenstein Atrium on January 19. Three performers have been nominated by Lincoln Center. Beginning on November 16, audience members will vote for their favorite artist via social media. The selection of the winner will be announced on December 14.

“We are proud to partner with Lincoln Center to expand the vibrant legacy of American Songbook,” said David Hunt, President and CEO of Prudential Investment Management. “American Songbook continues to be a marvelous series that celebrates and makes accessible the dynamic scope of American music performed by a blend of legendary performers and emerging talent.”