" The Near West Theatre presentation...in some respects surpassed the Big Apple production with raw energy and enthusiasm ...(NWT has) taught these young adults some very exciting things about theater, creativity, and expressing what's deep inside, and some very valuable lessons about life."

Scene Magazine

 

THE SECRET GARDEN

Book and lyrics by Marsha Norman

Music by Lucy Simon

Based on the novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett

May 7 - 23, 2010

"High on a hill sits a big old house
with something wrong inside it.
Someone died and someone's left behind
and can't abide it."  - The Dreamers

This enchanting classic of children's literature is now a brilliant musical by a Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, Marsha Norman.  Orphaned in India, Mary Lennox, an 11-year old girl returns to Yorkshire to live with an embittered, reclusive uncle and his invalid son. The estate includes a magic locked garden. Flashbacks, dream sequences, a strolling chorus of ghosts, and some of the most beautiful music ever written for Broadway dramatize this inspiring story about the restorative powers of love, regeneration and rebirth.

"Elegant, entrancing.... The best American musical of the Broadway season."-- Time.

"A splendid, intelligent musical.... It's all you can hope for in children's theatre. But the best surprise is that this show is the most adult new musical of the season."-- U.S.A. Today.

"A many splendored children's fable that neither cloys or loses grip on its unique spell."-- N.Y. Newsday.
 

RENT: School Edition

Performed entirely by students
Book, music and lyrics by Jonathan Larson
Musical arrangements Steve Skinner
Original concept/additional lyrics Billy Aronson
Music supervision and additional arrangements Tim Weil
Dramaturg Lynn Thomson
RENT was originally produced in New York by New York Theatre Workshop and on Broadway by Jeffrey Seller, Kevin McCollum, Allan S. Gordon and New York Theatre Workshop

July 23 - August 8, 2010

"There's only us, there's only this. 
Forget regret, or life is yours to miss.
No other road, no other way. No day, but today." - Mimi

Jonathan Larson's Pulitzer Prize winning Broadway musical based loosely on Puccini's opera La Bohème. In its examination of the lifestyles of the young men and women who inhabit the slums of the Village, the play becomes a celebration of life and the heroic struggle to survive.

The day Jonathan Larson (creator of Rent) died….
"The audience was reaching out to the cast. They were crying and cheering. By the second act, it was no longer contained. It was the full show run full-out. If emotion could have become a physical force, the roof would have blown off, the weather would have changed. The second act ended. There was a huge ovation, the cast slowly left the stage, and the audience stayed in the theater. No one was sure what to do. The cast returned and sat down in the front row. Finally, a single voice called from the audience, ‘Thank you, Jonathan Larson,’ which brought the evening's loudest, final burst of applause.”

To purchase tickets, call: 216-961-6391

Curtain time for all productions:
Thursdays, Fridays & Saturday performances @ 7:30 p.m.
Sunday performances @ 3:00 p.m.

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