Imagine a giant jukebox exploding with the soundtrack of a generation! Come meet the super duper lady responsible for all that musical magic. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, it is also in the ear of the listener as well, especially if you’re talking about the wonderful singer/songwriter Carole King. Her incredible musical story has been captured in a 2014 Grammy, Outer Critic, Olivier, Drama Desk and Tony Award winning show “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical” and it is jumpstarting its sparkle and sass at A.C.T. of CT in Ridgefield until Sunday, November 22 and it is not to be missed.
From the musical moment when a teenage King penned her first hit “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” her career has been a rocket launch to the sky filed with stars, with 100 hit songs, 400 compositions, immortalized by more than 1000 artists. Legends like James Taylor, Aretha Franklin and Lady Gaga have ridden the coattails of her musical genius, resulting in her winning an avalanche of achievement awards in the industry.
Douglas McGrath has taken a tale about a hesitant teen, a Jewish girl named Carole Klein, and spun it like gold into a Cinderella story of a voice that propelled a generation. Called both awesome and amazing, with a parade of wall-to-wall hits like “You’ve Got a Friend,” “Up on the Roof,” “The Locomotion,” “Take Good Care of My Baby,” “I Feel the Earth Move” and "Some Kind of Wonderful,” the show is a guaranteed crowd pleaser, one dazzling hit at a time. All the almost 30 hits you’ll hear are all written by the two song teams, Goffin and King and their rival cohorts Mann and Weil and are brought to outstanding life by such groups as the Shirelles and the Drifters and such performers as Neil Sedaka, Little Eva and The Righteous Brothers.
Julia Bain is wonderful as the young and eager artist Carole King who needs to believe in herself and her incredible gifts and Jake Goz is her willing partner Gerry Goffin who never feels his life is quite enough and seeks his feelings of success elsewhere.
Following King from the time she meets her future husband and writing partner Gerry Goffin at Queens College, “Beautiful” encapsulates the triumphs and tragedies of her roller coaster life and her path to a pinnacle of success. Her collaboration with best friends and married musical partners Cynthia Weil (Mary Grace Humphries) and Barry Mann (Barrett Riggins) is inspirationally documented. Parker Esse serves as both devoted director and choreographer. A dramatic and versatile set by David Goldstein and Matthew Herman makes the drama flow smoothly.
For tickets ($90 and up), call A Contemporary Theatre of CT, 36 Old Quarry Road, Ridgefield at 475-215-5497 or online at boxoffice@actofct.org.. Performances are Wednesday and Thursday at 7 p.m., Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. A show Sunday, November 15 at 7 p.m. has been added.
Come let the earth move under your feet in some kind of wonderful way as you enjoy this stupendous salute to one of America’s sweetheart singer/songwriters, Carole King.
No comments:
Post a Comment