American Star!!! by Emmy Winners
Theater for the New City April 11 to 28
By: Jonathan Slaff - Mar 27, 2013
Theater for the New City presents"American Star!!!," a new rockin', boppin' family musical by William Electric Black and Gary Schreiner, both Emmy-winners. The show whimsically examines teenagers' fascination with make-me-a-celebrity TV shows. Performances are April 11 to 28, Th-Sat at 8:00 PM and Sun at 3:00 PM. Running time is :90. Critics are invited on or after April 12.
No grown-up wants their child to skip college to become the next Idol-like celebrity. But what do you say to your teenage daughter when she announces, "I got a 1200 on my SAT's. That makes my safety school Fairway! So I hafta get to the American Star tryouts."? Yes, it's hard to get 'em back to SAT prep after they've been indoctrinated by "Glee," "The Voice" and "X Factor." This is a musical for people soon applying to college and for adults trying to live through it, in other words, for audiences aged 13 to 93. The piece sports 17 original numbers, an ensemble of ten actors and a three-piece live band. Book, lyrics and direction are by William Electric Black.
The show's the saga of Stacey Star, a high school bullying target with low SAT's, who dreams of becoming a superstar and auditioning for "American Star," a talent show emceed by the glamorous African-American celebrity Maxine Mack. Unfortunately, so does her arch-rival, Kelly Dumbrowski, a popular "Queen Bee" with high SAT's who has changed her name to Kim, in loving emulation of Kim Kardashian. Stacey's odyssey enroute to her big audition (and her eventual fairy-tale triumph over Kelly) is the plot of the musical, which is sung and danced with the wit and humor that earned fame for William Electric Black as a writer on "Sesame Street."
You may be familiar with William Electric Black from his sensational and serious "Lonely Soldier Monologues: Women at War in Iraq" (TNC, 2009), based on a book by Helen Benedict. The play earned widespread notice and significantly helped issues of female soldiers to be widely recognized for the first time. "American Star!!!" represents the "other" genre of Black's theatrical work, which is creating delightful musicals for family audiences. Too bad if you missed his last two rock musicals at TNC, "Betty and the Belrays" (2007), in which three white female singers challenged a racially divided society by singing for a black record label, and "My Boyfriend is a Zombie" (2010), which was like Grease with a zombie twist. Writing as Ian Ellis James, Black has won seven Emmys as a writer for "Sesame Street," composing songs for Queen Latifah, Erykah Badu, Patti Labelle, and Arrested Development when they appeared on the show. He is curator of the Poetry Electric reading series at La MaMa and a professor at NYU's Tisch School.
Co-composer Gary Schreiner received an Emmy for his work on the PBS special "Sneakers," starring Jon Secada. and writes music actively for films, TV and theater. He has contributed music to 23 feature films, including "Donnie Brasco," "Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector" and "Tiptoes." In theater, he scored Alison Larkin's hit one woman show, "The English American," which led to the bestselling novel of the same name. He collaborated with Black on the TNC production of "My Boyfriend is a Zombie" (2010).
For complete info, see: http://www.jsnyc.com/season/American_Star.htm