Arts & Entertainment
Tony-Winning Musical Coming to the Lesher Center Friday
Diablo Theatre Company presents the charming, romantic and high-stepping Broadway hit, "The Drowsy Chaperone," starting this Friday at the Lesher Center.
Diablo Theatre Company will present the East Bay premiere of the hit Broadway musical comedy The Drowsy Chaperone in a high-stepping production that producers promise will be anything but drowsy.
“With a talented cast of 19 singers and dancers backed by a swinging 12-piece orchestra, glitzy costumes and sets, and an abundance of laughs, this is just the show to uplift the spirits,” says Daren A. C. Carollo, the company’s artistic director who is directing the production. “It’s hilarious, one of the funniest musicals ever written.”
The show opens Friday and continues for 13 performances through March 5 at the Lesher Center for the Arts.
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The Drowsy Chaperone not only earned five Tony Awards, more than any other musical of the 2006 season, but seven Drama Desk awards as well.
The show revolves around a modern-day musical theater addict known as “man in chair.” To chase his blues away, he drops the needle on his favorite LP, the 1928 musical “The Drowsy Chaperone.” From the crackle of his hi-fi, the musical bursts to life on stage, telling a tale of a pampered Broadway starlet. She wants to quit show business to get married but her producer sets out to sabotage the nuptials, her chaperone, the debonair groom, the dizzy chorine, the Latin lover and, for good measure, a pair of gangsters who double as pastry chefs.
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Starring as the “man in chair” is Michael Patrick Gaffney, an actor familiar to audiences throughout the Bay Area. He has appeared with Broadway by the Bay, San Jose Stage Company, Town Hall Theatre, 42nd Street Moon, and New Conservatory Theatre among others.
Leanne Borghesi, who has performed in musicals in San Francisco as well as cabarets there and in New York, plays The Drowsy Chaperone.
Sheri Stockdale, a veteran award-winning choreographer in the region, is choreographing the show. G. Scott Lacy is the musical director. He conducted the orchestra for the company’s production of Irving Berlin’s White Christmas last year.
Tickets are $17-$48. You can purchase them by calling the Lesher Center box office 925-943-7469 or by visiting www.lesherartscenter.orgwww.diablotheatrecompany.org.
