Monday, March 31, 2008

Single tickets for 7 Dallas Summer Musicals shows now on sale

By Shawn Parikh

Dallas Summer Musicals has quite an exciting season ahead. Today, single tickets for seven of their big shows have gone on sale. Tickets can be purchased online or by calling 214-631-ARTS (2787).

Here are the shows that have gone on sale:

• April 15-27, 2008: The Wedding Singer kicks off the Dallas Summer Musicals’ 2008 season at the Music Hall at Fair Park. The Tony® nominated Broadway musical comedy called by Newsday “One Big Party! A good-natured, high-energy musical,” is based on the 1998 hit film starring Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore. It’s the 1980s, with junk bonds, MTV, leg warmers and Duran Duran, but Robbie Hart lives in his grandmother’s basement in New Jersey and sings in a wedding band. Dreams of being a singer/songwriter are gone, replaced by a desire to find the right girl and settle down. When his fiancée leaves him at the altar, he becomes a wedding planner’s worst nightmare, taking out his bitterness on stage.
• April 29-May 11, 2008: Rain: The Beatles Experience at the Music Hall at Fair Park. Covers the Fab Four from their very first Ed Sullivan Show appearance through the Abbey Road album, through the psychedelic late 60s and their long-haired hippie, hard-rocking rooftop days. Rain is a multi-media, multi-dimensional experience...a fusion of historical footage and hilarious television commercials from the 1960s lights up video screens and live cameras zoom in for close-ups.
• May 13-25, 2008: Ring of Fire—the music and story of Johnny Cash at the Music Hall at Fair Park. In many ways Johnny Cash wrote and sang about the lives we all lead, regardless of where we lead them. If, watching RING OF FIRE, you feel yourself being drawn back to your roots, it isn't accidental -- even if you've forgotten what those roots are. From the heart of the songs of Johnny Cash comes a unique musical show about love and faith, struggle and success, rowdiness and redemption, home and family. Ring of Fire features 38 of the music legend’s songs such as “Country Boy,” “A Thing Called Love,” “Five Feet High and Rising,” “Daddy Sang Bass,” “Ring of Fire,” “I Walk the Line,” “I’ve Been Everywhere,” “The Man in Black,” and his final hit, “Hurt.” By the end of the show you will feel that you have spent the evening in the presence of an extraordinary and real man.
• May 27-June 1, 2008: Cats returns to the Music Hall at Fair Park as a subscribers’ special. Based on 'Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats' and other poems by T.S. Eliot, the musical takes place in a junkyard where the local cats are auditioning to be chosen by their leader, Old Deuteronomy, to journey to the Heavyside Lair to be reborn. In the end, the former glamour cat, Grizabella - turned disheveled outcast is chosen by Deuteronomy to receive the prized additional life.
• June 3-15, 2008: The Drowsy Chaperone presented by Dallas Summer Musicals at the Music Hall at Fair Park. It won the most 2006 Tony® Awards of any musical on Broadway. It all begins when a die-hard musical fan plays his favorite cast album, a 1928 smash hit called “The Drowsy Chaperone,” and the show magically bursts to life. We are instantly immersed in the glamorous, hilarious tale of a celebrity bride and her uproarious wedding day, complete with thrills and surprises that take both the cast (literally) and the audience (metaphorically) soaring into the rafters.
• June 17-22, 2008: STOMP!, the International Sensation returns to the Music Hall at Fair Park as a subscribers’ special. The scenes are staged with a meticulous rhythm - quick, consistent and with just enough variety to keep your concentration from wandering. Drummers work within the framework of rudimentary narratives and superficially distinct characters portrayed by a splendidly athletic ensemble. Performers make music by tapping a matchbox or twisting a creaking folding chair. The show convinces its audience that the background music of our everyday lives is worth listening to.
• June 24-29, 2008: Hairspray presented by Dallas Summer Musicals as a subscribers’ special, returns to the Music Hall at Fair Park. Welcome to the ‘60s! It’s 1962 – the ‘50s are out and change is in the air. Baltimore’s Tracy Turnblad, a big girl with big hair and an even bigger heart, has only one passion – to dance. She wins a spot on the local TV dance program, “The Corny Collins Show” and, overnight, is transformed from outsider to irrepressible teen celebrity. But can a trendsetter in dance and fashion vanquish the program’s reigning princess, win the heart of hearthrob Link Larkin, and integrate a television show without denting her ‘do?

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