Announcement from Performance Riverside:

As the grand finale to its 2011-2012 season, Performance Riverside presents the Oscar and Tony award winning smash hit Chicago.

Bob Fosse choreographed the original production, and his style is strongly identified with the show. The music is by John Kander with lyrics by Fred Ebb and a book by Ebb and Fosse.  This production is under the direction of Performance Riverside’s Producing Artistic Director Matt Neves, with choreography by Valerie Rachelle and Rhett Guter and musical direction Scott Smith.

The original Broadway production opened in 1975, and ran for 936 performances.  Chicago’s 1996 Broadway revival holds the record for the longest-running musical revival on Broadway and is its fourth longest-running show.  As of January 2012, it has played for more than 6,200 performances.

Set in Prohibition-era Chicago, the story lampoons corruption in the administration of criminal justice, and the concept of the “celebrity criminal”.  The musical is based on a 1926 play of the same name by reporter Maurine Dallas Watkins about actual criminals and crimes she reported on.

In this razor sharp satire set in roaring twenties Chicago, chorus girl Roxie Hart murders her faithless lover and convinces her hapless husband Amos to take the rap.  That is, until he finds out he’s been duped and turns on Roxie.  Convicted and sent to death row, Roxie and another “Merry Murderess” Velma Kelly, vie for the spotlight and the headlines, ultimately joining forces in search of the “American Dream”: fame, fortune and acquittal.

Performance Riverside’s cast has Chelsea Franko in the role of Roxie Hart, Ayelet Firstenberg as Velma Kelly, Jason Webb as Billy Flynn, Jamie Snyder as Amos Hart, Kami Crump as Momma Morton, Chris Sands as Mary Sunshine, and an ensemble including Dominique Araiza, Erica Beck, Heather Biede, Tyler Burk, David St. Pierre, Bryan Martinez, Alyx Michele, Robert Parkison, Clifford Plummer, Cesare G. Quintero, Kirklyn Robinson, Salisha Thomas and Matt Wiley.

Chicago opens on Friday, June 1st and runs for two weekends at Landis Performing Arts Center on the RCC campus, located at 4800 Magnolia Avenue in Riverside.

Evening shows are June 1, 2, 8, and 9 at 8:00 p.m.; and matinees are June 2, 3, 9, and 10 at 2:00 p.m.

Tickets start at $27 and can be purchased online by clicking HERE, or at the Box Office at 951-222-8100.

Filed under News A2, Entertainment

Sunday, June 3, 2012

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