Articles Tagged With: Jess Simonson

Director Eric Bray Jr. (subbing for Matthew Peterson) as The Fiddler in Fiddler on the Roof ???? Matthew Peterson

Fiddler on the Roof at Phoenix Festival Theater

Reviews September 20, 2024 Amanda N. Gunther

Wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles! Phoenix Festival Theater is up in production for the fall! And they’re bringing a time-honored classic, some might call it a musical theatre tradition— Fiddler on the Roof. Directed by Eric Bray Jr., whose main stage directorial debut could not have been more successful, with Musical Direction by Rebecca Rossello, and Choreography by Karlie Surgeon, this insightfully nuanced and emotionally driven production is truly an extraordinary feat,

Eric Bray as Ja'far ???? Matthew Peterson

Twisted: The Untold Story of a Royal Vizier at Street Lamp Community Theatre

Reviews February 9, 2024 Amanda N. Gunther

No one mourns the Twisted.

No one cries they won’t return (…of Jafar, terrible movie. Just terrible.)

No one lays a Jasmin on their graaaave.

The good man scorns the Twisted.

Through their lives our children learn.

What we miss— when we misbehaaaave.

And goodness knows— the Twisted’s lives are zany!

Beauty & The Beast at Phoenix Festival Theatre. ????Matthew Peterson

Beauty and The Beast at Phoenix Festival Theatre

Reviews March 3, 2023 Amanda N. Gunther

Well, who’d have thought? Well, bless my soul! Well, who’d have guessed? Well, who indeed? That Phoenix Festival Theatre would be sold out before you could be their guest? Just wait and see— standing room at least— that’s all that’s left for their stunning production of Beauty and The Beast. Disney has a funny way of enchanting ticket buyers to purchase tickets before the run even truly gets underway. Good luck finding someone who wants to give up their ticket to this sold-out performance.

Cinderella at Street Lamp Community Theatre

Reviews November 11, 2022 Amanda N. Gunther

In their own little corner, on their own little stage, they can produce whatever they want to show.

And with their own type of magic, they invite you to enjoy, Cinderella, a sweet fairytale that you love and know. Why, bippity-boppity-boo! It’s Street Lamp Community Theatre’s production of Rogers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella. (The original as it stands, not the more recently ‘updated’ version.) Sweet and charming and simplistically joyful,

Mikey Floyd (left) as Will with Eric Bray Jr. (center) as Johnny and Austin Barnes (right) as Tunny in American Idiot. ????Matthew Peterson AUGUST 2022

American Idiot at Street Lamp Community Theatre

Reviews August 5, 2022 Amanda N. Gunther

This is the dawning of the rest of our lives! This is their lives on holiday! Take a holiday from your summer holiday and get all the gritty, grungy, emotional-super-charge you need to power through the back-half of this blistering, climate-change-infested, politically unstable nightmare that is the America that we now live in. Don’t want to be an American Idiot? Then get your ass up to Rising Sun and check out Street Lamp Community Theatre’s production of Green Day’s American Idiot.

Tarzan at Phoenix Festival Theatre

Reviews June 18, 2022 Amanda N. Gunther

Sure as the sun turns to moon— Phoenix Festival Theatre is putting on Disney’s Tarzan and it’s a world of wonder and whimsy, talent and heartfelt experiences! Directed and choreographed by Bambi Johnson with Musical Direction by Nathan Scavilla, this tremendous theatrical undertaking is swinging to wild and vivacious life at The Amoss Center in Bel Air for just three performances! A remarkably refreshing journey through all of your favorite numbers from the animated screen gem,

Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson at Milburn Stone Theatre

Reviews January 13, 2017 Amanda N. Gunther

Milburn Stone Theatre live at Elkton Station are the people who make things happen! Sometimes with guns, sometimes with speeches, sometimes with other things too— like their current production of Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson, running a one-weekend only performance to kick off the 2017 season. At a time when political satire could not be more important and more revered, Director Andrew Mitchell and Musical Director J. Andrew Dickenson come together to put the people of <19th Century>