Musicals Aborning
Ed Dixon?s Richard Cory is one of three new musicals featured in Premieres? inaugural season of staged readings.
(Photo: Nancy Rosati, thepimpernel.com)
According to artistic director Paulette Haupt, who is also a co-founder and artistic director of the musical theater conference at the O'Neill Theater Center: "Our executive producer for Premieres, Ed Trach, is a regular visitor to musical theater workshops and readings around New York and elsewhere. Ed came to be about a year ago and said he was interested in supporting and promoting new works that were already well on their way to bigger productions but had not yet been seen by a New York audience." In contrast to other developmental programs, Haupt says, "Our primary purpose is to bring works that are far more than embryonic a little further along in their journey."
The three new musicals to be presented during Premieres' premiere season are: Heartland, with book and lyrics by Darrah Cloud and music by Kim D. Sherman, "the story of a mother and her three daughters who try to recapture the past as they confront the future" (May 25 at 2pm, May 27 at 8pm, and May 28 at 2 and 8pm); Richard Cory, with book, music, and lyrics by Ed Dixon, adapted from the Edwin Arlington Robinson (May 25 at 8pm, May 26 at 2 and 8pm, May 27 at 2 pm); and Song of the Turtledove, with a libretto by Noa Ain and music by Ain and Gerard Edery, freely based on the biblical Song of Songs and featuring a mixture of American classical jazz and Arabic/Jewish/flamenco music (May 31 at 8pm, June 1 at 2pm, June 2 at 8pm, and June 2 at 2pm).
Haupt says that Premieres has been gestating for some time. "It always takes a while to set up a not-for-profit corporation," she notes. "That's what we did over the past year. Meanwhile, we were formulating our mission, deciding on the kind of works we'd be looking for and the kind of presentations we'd like to do. We felt that 'less is more.' If a story could be told in space and light and communicate the material and the characters, we thought, that would be a fine way to start. In the future, we may look at more elaborate presentations but, this year, they'll be quite simple. Both Heartland and Richard Cory will be done with books in hand and piano accompaniment. Song of the Turtledove was written for an ensemble of three singers and three musicians, and that's what we'll have."