NEWS
May 20, 2010
The lights of Broadway
By ARNOLD WAYNE JONES | Life+Style Editor jones@dallasvoice.com
Chorale baptizes the Wyly with its first showtunes-only concert in 15 years
TCC: OFF BROADWAY
Wyly Theatre, 2400 Flora St. May 26–29 at 8 p.m., May 29 at 3 p.m. $20-$65. TurtleCreek.org.
With so many gay men and so many costume changes, the Turtle Creek Chorale must be a bastion of theater queens, and of course they always do an annual “best of Broadway” concert.
You’d think so, wouldn’t you?
“No! We haven’t done a showtunes concert in 15 years,” confesses Jonathan Palant, artistic director for the chorale. “And in our 38 CD collection, we don’t have a Broadway album.”
Sure, theater and movie songs wind their way into most TCC performances — a gay man can hardly conceive of winter without thinking of Judy singing “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” — but, no, Palant says. Just not a staple. “It is certainly atypical of a chorus of our makeup.”
But this is the season that the chorale becomes the first local arts group to perform at all three Arts District venues: the Meyerson (now 20 years old), the Winspear last year and, for the subscription season-ender, the Wyly Theatre.
“It’s a theater — we need to do theater music,” Palant says. “We have a history of opening every concert hall in the Metroplex during its inaugural season, and what better show to put on in the new theater than a Broadway show?”
The concert will be a change of pace for the chorale in other ways. Among them: No dresses! (There will be a locker room scene, though, including a little manflesh.) And the tuxedo’d singers will look a little cooler, riffing off the Wyly’s signature green color scheme.
“It’s a real mixture of heartwarming songs you knew as a child and ones that put a smile on your face,” Palant says.
The concert is structured like a Broadway musical, with acts and scenes devoted to particular themes: Kander & Ebb, love songs, 11 o’clock numbers and for the finale, A Chorus Line.
“Michael Serrecchia, who was in the original Broadway production of A Chorus Line, is directing the show,” Palant says. “We’re even doing the original choreography to ‘One,’” as well as performing other hits from the landmark musical, like “What I Did for Love.”
That could make for a singular sensation.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition May 21, 2010.
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