©Seattle Post Intelligencer Nov. 24, 2000 Holiday Theater Season Bursting With Hits By Duston Harvey
Boy gets girl. And they sing and dance. Boy loses girl. And they sing and dance. Boy gets girl. And everybody sings and dances. Ah, the classic American musical comedy! Two of the most successful examples of the genre open in Seattle in the coming week as a month of entertainment merrymaking gets under way in the region's theaters, concert halls and auditoriums. The 5th Avenue and Paramount theaters, those grandiose one-time movie palaces that now play host to homegrown and touring musicals, are presenting Cole Porter's Anything Goes and Irving Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun. Most of the region's theaters are launching their annual holiday offerings, from The Christmas Carol and Citizen Scrooge to Black Nativity and Sanders Family Christmas. And the holiday concert season gets started, although most of the musical offerings will come in the first couple weeks of December. Anything Goes is directed and choreographed by David Armstrong, the 5th Avenue's new producing artistic director, who says he picked it because it's the "epitome of the great music comedy," with a book that's "a great excuse for gags, girls and songs" and has the irreverence of the Marx Brothers' comedies of the same mid-'30s period. "It's been a joy to put together because it's so much fun," he said. "Then you combine that with the genius of Cole Porter's music and lyrics, written when he was at the peak of his powers," he said. "It's loaded with hit songs." They include "Anything Goes," "All Through the Night," "It's Delovely," "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick Out of You" and "Blow, Gabriel, Blow." In addition, it's a tap-happy musical that Armstrong could choreograph. "I hadn't done a big dance show in a couple years. It's an opportunity to put big splashy dance numbers on stage, with all the sheer joy musical comedy can bring." The cast is headed by Broadway veterans Dee Hoty as Reno Sweeney, Bronson Pinchot as Sir Evelyn Oakleigh and Michael Gruber as Billy Crocker, but most of the more than 30 performers are from the Seattle area. "When I came here, one of my goals was to get to know the local talent pool as well and as fast as possible," Armstrong said. "We held a series of auditions and saw more than 400 local actors. As I expected, there was a really rich pool of talent that we weren't tapping before. We've decided to make that a priority but only in a way that makes the show good in any event. We cast here and in Los Angeles and New York. And we ended up with the overwhelming majority of the talent, in leading, supporting and ensemble roles, from the Seattle area." main Anything Goes 2000 page

©Seattle Post Intelligencer
Nov. 24, 2000

Holiday Theater Season Bursting With Hits
By Duston Harvey

Boy gets girl. And they sing and dance. Boy loses girl. And they sing and dance. Boy gets girl. And everybody sings and dances.

Ah, the classic American musical comedy!

Two of the most successful examples of the genre open in Seattle in the coming week as a month of entertainment merrymaking gets under way in the region's theaters, concert halls and auditoriums.

The 5th Avenue and Paramount theaters, those grandiose one-time movie palaces that now play host to homegrown and touring musicals, are presenting Cole Porter's Anything Goes and Irving Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun.

Most of the region's theaters are launching their annual holiday offerings, from The Christmas Carol and Citizen Scrooge to Black Nativity and Sanders Family Christmas.

And the holiday concert season gets started, although most of the musical offerings will come in the first couple weeks of December.

Anything Goes is directed and choreographed by David Armstrong, the 5th Avenue's new producing artistic director, who says he picked it because it's the "epitome of the great music comedy," with a book that's "a great excuse for gags, girls and songs" and has the irreverence of the Marx Brothers' comedies of the same mid-'30s period. "It's been a joy to put together because it's so much fun," he said.

"Then you combine that with the genius of Cole Porter's music and lyrics, written when he was at the peak of his powers," he said. "It's loaded with hit songs." They include "Anything Goes," "All Through the Night," "It's Delovely," "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick Out of You" and "Blow, Gabriel, Blow."

In addition, it's a tap-happy musical that Armstrong could choreograph. "I hadn't done a big dance show in a couple years. It's an opportunity to put big splashy dance numbers on stage, with all the sheer joy musical comedy can bring."

The cast is headed by Broadway veterans Dee Hoty as Reno Sweeney, Bronson Pinchot as Sir Evelyn Oakleigh and Michael Gruber as Billy Crocker, but most of the more than 30 performers are from the Seattle area.

"When I came here, one of my goals was to get to know the local talent pool as well and as fast as possible," Armstrong said. "We held a series of auditions and saw more than 400 local actors. As I expected, there was a really rich pool of talent that we weren't tapping before. We've decided to make that a priority but only in a way that makes the show good in any event. We cast here and in Los Angeles and New York. And we ended up with the overwhelming majority of the talent, in leading, supporting and ensemble roles, from the Seattle area."

main Anything Goes 2000 page