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Nothing There For You

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Chase of The Thrill, 1

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Remote, part 1

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POETRY

April's Fools

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...simple answers

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Albany Civic Theater

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Barrington Stage 2019

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Alix Korey

All My Sons

American Son

An Enemy of the People

Art

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Broadway Bounty Hunter

Butler

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Carousel

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Fyvush Finkel

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Gaslight

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Glass Menagerie

Going to St. Ives

The Golem of Havana

Guys and Dolls

His Girl Friday

I Am My Own Wife

Kimberly Akimbo

BSC's Kiss Me, Kate

KT Sullivan: Colored Lts.

Kunstler

A Little More Alive

Lord of the Flies

Lost in Yonkers

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Much Ado About Nothing

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My Name is Asher Lev

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On the Town

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peerless

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Ragtime

Romance in Hard Times

Royal Family of Broadway

Scott and Hem. . . .

See How They Run

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A Streetcar Named Desire

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Taking Steps

This

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Underneath the Lintel

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A Little Night Music

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Eric Hill's Macbeth

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Mary and Edith

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Red Remembers

Same Time, Next Year

Sick

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Thoreau or, Return to Wal

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The Who's Tommy

Waiting for Godot

Bridge Street Theatre

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there is a happiness. . .

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F&J in the Claire De Lune

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Frankenstein: etc.

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How To Pray

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Capital Rep

Red Maple

Miss Bennet: Xmas at Pemb

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Ring of Fire

Blithe Spirit

Paris Time

She Loves Me in Albany

Sex With Strangers

CapRep Mamma Mia!

Assisted Loving

Chester Theatre - 2018

Chester's The Aliens

Mary's Wedding

Disgraced

Bar Mitzvah Boy

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Almost, Maine

Animals Out of Paper

Chester's Amish Project

Annapurna

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Blackbird

blink

Body Awareness

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Every Brilliant Thing

Folk

The Gospel. . .Discord

I and You

An Iliad

Madagascar

Memory House

The Mountaintop

My Jane

A Number

Oh God

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The Swan

Tilted House

Copake Theatre Company

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I Do! I Do!

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Grace & Glorie

Dorset Theatre Fest 2018

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Cry It Out

DORSET ARCHIVED REVIEWS

All in the Timing

American Buffalo

Barefoot in the Park

Baskerville

Boeing-Boeing by Camolett

Christie's The Mousetrap

Clybourne Park

Deathtrap

Dear Elizabeth

Dial "M" For Murder

Downstairs

Fallen Angels

Good People

The Hollow

I Hate Hamlet

Intimate Apparel

June Moon

Lady Day at Emerson's Bar

Legend of Georgia McBride

Marry Me a Little

Mauritius

Merton of the Movies

Murder on the Nile

Noises Off

Out of the City

Outside Mullingar

Red

St. Nicholas

S Holmes & the Jersey Lil

Superior Donuts

Table Manners

Tarnation Russell Colvin

The Novelist

The Pavilion

The Scene

The Way of The World

The Whore and Mr. Moore

A Year with Frog and Toad

Ghent Playhouse 2018/2019

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Elves and Shoemaker

The Father

Ghent Playhouse Archives

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Ali Baba...4 Tea Thieves

Ayckbourn at Ghent

Belles

Boeing-Boeing GPH

The Boys Next Door

Cabaret in Ghent

Clever Little Lies

Clue: The Musical

Complete Wm Shakespeare

The Countess

Dancing at Lughnasa

Coward's Fallen Angels

Fantasticks

Ghent's "Dial M...."

Grapes of Wrath

Greater Tuna

Hair Loom!

Hay Fever

The Heiress

Heroes in Ghent

House of Dwarfs

The Imaginary Invalid

Jack and the Beanstalk

Jerry's Girls

Lettice and Lovage

Enchanted April

The Little Mermaid. . .

Ghent "Little Shop"

Lost: The Grimm Years

Madwoman of Chaillot

Menagerie A Trois

Mothers and Sons

Mrs. Farnsworth

My Cousin Rachel

O.P.M. at Ghent

Once Upon a Mattress

Ghent: Our Town

Over the River, etc.

Pack of Lies

Picnic

Prisoner/2nd Avenue

Puss in Boots

Rabbit Hole in Ghent

Robin Hood: 50 Shades. .

6 Women...

Ghent's 39 Steps

True West Ghent

The Turn of the Scrooge

The 25th Annual Putnam...

Urinetown

The Weir

You're a Good Man, Charli

Goodspeed Musicals

Drowsy Chaperone CT

GoodspeedOliver!

The Will Rogers Follies

Rags

Thoroughly Modern Musical

Chasing Rainbows

Bye Bye Birdie/Goodspeed

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Hartford Stage

A Lesson from Aloes

Hubbard Hall

The Velocity of Autumn

Mystery of Edwin Drood

menagerie

Book Club Play

HH - Crucible

Illiad

Tartuffe

Shakespeare's King Lear

Parellel Lives

Ondine

Hubbard Shirley Valentine

Shakespeare's Macbeth

The Drawer Boy

You Can't Take It With Yo

Literature

An Unlikely Hero

Antibes

B ob Dylan

Christmasville

A Lesser Saint

Upstreet, #1

Living Room Theatre

LRTs Three Sisters

MacHaydn Theater-2018

Annie at the Mac

Mac's Wedding Singer

Hunchback of Notre Dame

Machaydn Mamma Mia

Mac-Haydn Cabaret

Funny Girl

Damn Yankees 2018

MACHAYDN ARCHIVED REVIEWS

Mac-Haydn's Addams Family

The All Night Strut

All Shook Up

Annie

Anything Goes

McHs Anything Goes

The Baker's Wife

Beauty and the Beast

Best Little Whorehouse...

Brigadoon

Bye Bye Birdie

Carousel at the Mac

Chicago

Chicago (2016)

Chorus Line

Crazy For You

Damn Yankees

Dirty Rot. Scoundrels

Dreamcoat

Drowsy Chaperone in Chath

Fair Lady

Mac Fantasticks

Fiddler in Chatham

forty-second Street

Machaydn's The Full Monty

Guys and Dolls in Chatham

Gypsy

Hairspray

Hairspray 2015

Hello, Dolly!

Hello, Dolly! '17

High Society

Into the Woods

Joseph. . .Dreamcoat

Jekyll and Hyde

The King and I

Kiss Me, Kate

La Cage aux Folles

Legally Blonde

Les Miz

Love a Piano

Mac-Haydn's Grease

Mame

Meet Me in St. Lou

The Music Man

Nice Work If You Can Get

9 to 5

Nunsense

Oliver!

Phantom

The Producers

R.D. Housewives of C.C.

Rent in Chatham

Saturday Night Fever

The Secret Garden

Show Boat

Singin' In The Rain

Sister Act

Smokey Joe's Cafe

Sondheim Putting It Toget

The Sound of Music

South Pacific

Spamalot

State Fair

McH's Sweeney Todd

Sweet Charity

Swing!

Thoroughly Modern Millie

West Side Story

Xanadu

Yng Frankenstein

Music

10 mini trios

Journeys by Robert Baksa

Mary Verdi: Precious Love

Mahagonny

New Stage Theatre Company

Death and The Maiden

Blood Sky

Fahrenheit 451

The Maids

Northern Stage

Living Together

NYSTI

Romeo & Juliet

And Then There Were None

King Island Christmas

A Legend of Sleepy Hollow

The Philadelphia Story

Yours, Anne

Orphan Train

Of Mice and Men

Twelve Angry Jurors

Anastasia

1776

Macbeth

Miracle On 34th Street

Arsenic and Old Lace

American Soup

Ordeal By Innocence

Reunion

Oldcastle Theatre 2018

LDJourney Into Night

Proof

The Fourth Wall

Oldcastle Whipping Man

. . .Israel Potter

OLDCASTLE ARCHIVED REVIEW

"Almost, Maine" in VT

Around the World in. . .

Beauty Queen of Leenane

Big River

Black Comedy

Broadway Bound

Cabaret

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

The City of Conversation

A Comedy of Tenors in VT

ConsulTrampAmerica'sSweet

Doubt in Vermont

4000 Miles

Fox on the Fairway

The Grass is Greener

Last Days of Mickey & Jea

Oldcastle Lion-Winter

Mauritius at Oldcastle

Moonlight & Magnolias

My Fair Lady

Night and Her Stars

Northern Boulevard

One Two Three

Other People's Money

Rembrandt's Gift

The Ride Down Mount Morgn

S. Holmes-Knight's Gambit

Shipwrecked

A Song For My Father

Strange Disappearance of

Tallley's Folly

Third

39 Steps

Time Stands Still

Proctors Schenectady

A Bronx Tale

Young Dr. Jekyll

On Your Feet

King and I

The Humans

Proctors Les Miserables

The Bodyguard, the musica

Finding Neverland

Fun Home

The Color Purple

Wicked

Restaurants

Bezalel Gables

Blantyre

Brazillian

Burrito Bound

SPICE!

Sand Lake Center for Arts

Men On Boats

SLCA Crucible

Sand Lake Annie

In the Heat of the Night

Schenectady Civic Players

The School for Lies

Other Desert Cities

An Inspector Calls

Shakespeare & Co 2018

HIR

S&COMothers&Sons

Heisenberg

As You Like It18

Creditors

Love's Labors Lost

Macbeth2018

Morning After Grace

Shakespeare & Co - 2017

Carnage, God of

Perfect Pair of Wharton

Tempest in the Garden

S&Cos Intimate Apparel

"Dream" in the Dell

Cymbeline 2017

S&C4000miles

Shakespeare & Co - 2016

Sotto Voce

The Two Gentlemen/Verona

Cry "Havoc!"

S&Co's "Or,"

Twelfth Night in the Dell

The Merchant of Venice

The Emperor of the Moon

Ugly Lies the Bone

The Taming

Shakespeare & Co. - 2015

An Illiad at S&Co

Red Velvet

Mother of the Maid

The Unexpected Man

The Comedy of Errors

Henry V

The How and The Why

Shakespeare & Co. - 2014

Private Eyes

Vanya, Sonia, Etc.

Henry IV, Parts One &Two

6-Actor Romeo and Juliet

TCWOWSabridged

Julius Caesar in Lenox

A Midsummer Night's Dream

The Servant of Two Master

Shakespeare's Will

Shakespeare & Co -2013

Private Lives

It's a Wonderful Life

Accomplice

Kaufman's Barber Shop

Beauty Queen/Leenane

Mother Courage...

Richard II

Love's Labour's Lost

Heroes

Master Class

Shakespeare&Co - 2012

The Liar

2012 Santaland

S&Co's The 39 Steps

Satchmo at the Waldorf

The Tempest

Parasite Drag

King Lear

Tale of Allergist's Wife

Cassandra Speaks

Shakespeare & Co-2011

The Learned Ladies

Cymbeline

Santaland

War of the Worlds

Red Hot Patriot

Broadway in the Berkshire

Baskervilles (Revisited)

Romeo and Juliet, 2011

The Hollow Crown

As You Like It

The Memory of Water

SHAKES & CO ARCHIVES

All's Well That Ends Well

Bad Dates

The Canterville Ghost

Cindy Bella

Real Inspector Hound

Dreamer Examines Pillow

Goatwoman of Corvis Count

Golda's Balcony

Hound of Baskervilles

Irma Vep, The Mystery of

Julius Caesar

The Ladies Man

Liaisons Dangereuses

Mengelberg and Mahler

Othello

Pinter's Mirror

Richard III

Romeo and Juliet

The Santaland Diaries

Sea Marks

Shirley Valentine

The Taster

Twelfth Night

White People

The Winter's Tale

Sharon Playhouse - 2018

Always. . .Patsy Cline

Barefoot in Sharon

Sharon Anything Goes

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Big River in Sharon

Far Away

Georgie

Gypsy in Sharon

TriArts' Les Miz

Little Shop of Horrors

Merrily We Roll Along

Minor Character

Sharon's Music Man

Quartet

Special Attractions

Terms of Endearment

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Grant and Twain

The Vagina Monologues

The Fabulous Lipitones

The Last Flapper

Karaoke Killer

Capitol Steps 2017

Masked Man

capitol steps 2016

Die Fledermaus

Grinder's Stand

Babylon Revisited

John

Dracula's Grandmother

Mock the Vote-CSteps 2015

The Aliens

It Shoulda Been You

Cranwell's Capitol Steps

Kill Me Now

The Garden of Martyrs

Capitol Steps 2013

The Capitol Steps

Doubt

Four Dogs and a Bone

Zara Spook & Other Lures

Trial of F.D.R.

Autres Temp. . .

Real Desperate Housewives

Capitol Steps for 2011

Ludwig Live!

The Seagull

On The Verge

Seascape

Starcrossed

"Earnest" in Albany

Paris, 1890--Unlaced

BCC's A Christmas Carol

Sister's Christmas Catech

The Pajame Game

Her Name is Vincent

Property Known as Garland

12th Night

I Know I Came...Something

Doubt, a Parable

Voices' A Christmas Carol

Dickens A Christmas Carol

Marie Galante

Machinal

Capitol Steps

Late Nite Catechism

Rabbit Hole

Taming of The Shrew

Mystery of Irma Vep

I Love a Piano

The News in Revue

The Mikado

Saturday Night Liv

A Chorus Line

BCC - Christmas Carol

Morgan O-Yuki

Rent

Stageworks Hudson 2013/14

Tomorrow in the Battle

Stockholm

Looped

Play by Play Unchained

Stagework Hudson Archives

The Amish Project

The Divine Sister

Forbidden Broadway

Imagining Madoff

Or,

Play By Play Blue Moons

Play By Play Shadows

The Rivalry

Tennis in Nablus

Theater Barn 2018

The Decorator

TBSpelling Bee

TB She Loves Me

Pump Boys at the Barn

The Mousetrap 2018

The Nerd

THEATER BARN ARCHIVES

A. Christie's The Hollow

The Addams Family

Agatha Christie's. .None

Altar Boyz

The Andrews Brothers

Better Late

Black Coffee

Boeing-Boeing

The Cocktail Hour

A Comedy of Tenors

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Don't Dress for Dinner

Don't Talk to the Actors

The Drowsy Chaperone

Evita

Forever Plaid

Forever Plaid-2016

The Full Monty

Funny Thing Happened

God of Carnage

Godspell-2012

Grease

Great American Trailer...

Gutenberg! The Musical

Guys and Dolls TB

Half and Half

Hello Muddah, Hello Fadda

Housewives of Columbia

How the Other Half Loves

TBarn's I Love a Piano

I Love You....Now Change

It Had To Be You

John & Jen

Leading Ladies

Lies & Legends

The Little Dog Laughed

Lucky Me

Moonlight and Magnolias

Five Course Love

Moon Over Buffalo

The Mousetrap

Murder at Howard Johnson

A Murder is Announced

The Musical of Musicals

Nunsense at TB

Red, White and Tuna

Romance, Romance

Same Time, etc.

Fantasticks at the Barn

Spider's Web

Christie's Spider's Web

Stones In His Pockets

The 39 Steps

They're Playing Our Song

Towards Zero

The Unexpected Guest

Veronica's Room

Visiting Mr. Green

The Wedding Singer

You Should Be So Lucky

Young Frankenstein

Zanna Don't!

Town Players--Pittsfield

New and Used

Prodigal Cow

The Rocky Horror Show

Love, Loss & What I Wore

The Whale

Win/Lose/Draw

The Shape of Things

Five Women..Same Dress

Skin Deep

Stop Kiss

Life Is Short

Visual Arts

Walking the dog 2018

WTG Richard II

WALKING THE DOG: ARCHIVED

BecomingFrederickDouglass

Bon Appetit!

Cyrano

daemons

Eurydice

The Gospel of John

i take your hand in mine

Lost Frontier of America

Our Town

The Owl and the Pussycat

Painting Churches

The Umbilical Point

Under Milk Wood

Vritue, Desire, etc.

Walking the dog's HAMLET

Who Am I This Time?

WAM Theatre Company

Ann

The Last Wife

emelieredux

The Bakelite Masterpiece

Special

Holy Laughter

In Darfur

Emilie

The Old Mezzo

Attic, Pearls & 3 Fine Gi

Melancholy Play

Weston Playhouse -2018

Two Trains Running

Million $$ Quartet

Weston Doll's House 2

West Side Weston

Fun Home in Weston

Weston's Our Town

Weston Playhouse Archived

Weston's All My Sons

Analog and Vinyl

Baskervilles in Vermont

Buyer & Cellar

Weston's Chorus Line

Educating Rita

Ella

42nd Street

A Funny Thing...Forum

Fully Committed

Weston's Guys & Dolls

The Light in the Piazza

Les Miserables

Long Day's Journey Into N

Mamma Mia

Weston's La Mancha

Murder For Two

Music Man

Next to Normal

No Child. . .

Once

Weston's Other Place

Peter and the Starcatcher

Pregnancy Pact

Pump Boys and Dinettes

A Raisin in the Sun

Rent - Weston

Round & Round the Garden

Souvenir

Tenderly

25th Spelling Bee

Weston's Uncle Vanya

V&S&M&Spike

Williamstown Theatre 2018

Dangerous House

The Member of the Wedding

Seared

Lempicka

Artney Jackson

The Sound Inside

The Closet

WTF ARCHIVED REVIEWS

5x10

A Doll's House

A Month in the Country

Actually

After the Revolution

An American Daughter

American Hero

And No More Shall We Part

Animal Crackers

The Atheist

Beyond Therapy

The Blue Deep

Broke-Ology

Caroline in Jersey

The Chinese Room

Children

The Clean House

Cost of Living

David Storey's "Home"

The Elephant Man

Far From Heaven

Fifth of July

A Flea in Her Ear

Fool For Love

Funny Thing/Forum

Funny Thing II

A Great Wilderness

Hapgood

Importance of/Earnest

An Intervention

It's Jewdy's Show

Johnny Baseball

WTF's June Moon

Kinship

Knickerbocker

The Last Goodbye

Legacy

A Legendary Romance

Living On Love

The Model American

Moon for the Misbegotten

Moscow, Moscow, . . .

Off the Main Road

The Old Man&The Old Moon

One Slight Hitch

Paradise Blue

Pygmalion

Quartermaine's Terms

Romance Novels for Dummie

The Roommate

The Rose Tattoo

Samuel J. and K.

She Loves Me

She Stoops To Conquer

Six Degrees of Separation

Streetcar Named Desire

Ten Cents a Dance

Three Hotels

Three Sisters

The Torch-Bearers

True West

Unknown Soldier

The Visit

What is..Cause of Thunder

Where Storms are Born

WTF's Our Town

All Shook Up, Music and lyrics by Elvis Presley, book by Joe DiPietro. Directed by John Saunders.

Reviewed by J. Peter Bergman


Heather Farney, Eric Chambliss, Gabe Belyeu, Ashley Kelly; photo provided

"I never knew I could care so much for someone I met just a minute ago."


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          William Shakespeare’s play "Twelfth Night" has inspired a whole host of musicals including "Your Own Thing" and "Music Is" and "Illyria" and the Duke Ellington jukebox show "Play On." Now on stage at the Mac-Haydn Theatre in Chatham, New York is the latest version, another jukebox musical featuring the songs of Elvis Presley, "All Shook Up." With an excellent book, drawn from the Shakespeare canon (including lots of bits and pieces from other plots by that theatrical master) by Joe DiPietro it is perhaps the best of the adaptations and certainly the most fun.

          The characters are all located in a small mid-western town in 1956. The lady Mayor has banned fun ( a take-off on the incidents in "Measure for Measure" ) and when a tall, handsome motorcycle-driving roustabout named Chad arrives his presence sets off a storm of love-making, dancing, singing and carousing. Two women fall in love with him and he inspires three other men to pursue the women they are secretly in love with. Likewise his effect on women is as encouraging and they make their moves as well. Ultimately even the Sherriff puts his moves on the Mayor. Just as in "A MidSummer Night’s Dream" the principal couples are separated into uneasy pairs who are in love with the wrong others. Every attempt to express feelings is given over instantly to a Presley song and, miraculously, they all work to the advantage of the plot and the character doing the singing. All of which is absolutely terrific.

          For this two weekend run the Mac-Haydn has assembled a perfect company. Heather Farney is perfect as Natalie Haller, a 16 year old auto mechanic who is instantly smitten with the roustabout. Like Rosalind in "As You Like It", or Viola in "Twelfth Night" she disguises herself as a man named Eddie and stays close to Chad with whom she is in love.

          Chad is played to the hip-rolling hilt by Eric Chambliss in a completely stellar way. He is so dynamic you literally cannot take your eyes off him when he is performing a Presley song; it’s as though he has channeled the rock-and-roll superstar.

          Gabe Belyeu plays Jim Haller, Natalie’s father with a combination of charm and grace that makes him the most sympathetic character in the show.

          Ashley Kelly is at the top of her game as Sylvia, long in love with Jim but never quite able to tell him. For Sylvia the 1950's fear of race "relationships" is too hard to handle and Kelly makes that clear and then overcomes it to deliver a first-rate performance all around.

          As her daughter Lorraine, newcomer Aliya Lorell delivers a most professional performance making herself a very welcome member of the company from her first entrance.

          James Cochran plays her young love, a 16 year-old white guy with a secret even he doesn’t know about. Cochran is a wonderful talent, handsome and musical and dramatic.

          Natalie’s best friend Dennis is portrayed by Scott Caron whose work is both quirky and emotionally moving. He has given us this performance earlier in the season, but here it is just the right set of choices doing all of the very right things Dennis needs to remain sympathetic rather than just pathetic.

          Laura Helm, who has been a joy all season, plays the museum director Miss Sandra and her natural sexiness along with her ultra-fine musical talents make this version of Shakespeare’s Olivia a truly desirable, unattainable heroine.

          Gillian Hassert has her day as Mayor Matilda Hyde, nearly stopping the show with Presley’s song "Devil In Disguise."

          Sherriff Earl, played by Ned Raube-Wilson, with his own rendition of "Can’t Help Falling in Love With You" adds much to his perturbed and/or concerned glances to create a marvelous character.

          As in all good comedies the ending is a happy one with a steal from "The Taming of the Shrew" where all the good couples are happily united and reunited through the "Burning Love" of Natalie and Chad.

          Holding all of this together is the fine work of two men, John Saunders who has directed the show and T. Dewayne Barrett who has delivered a choreographic message pulled straight out of a Presley film: if you can dance, if you can shove a hip to one side emphatically, you can have it all. Barrett delivers musical numbers to the stage with a joyous and inspiring oomph. With thirty-one (31) musical numbers to get through this is a daunting task, but presumably Saunders work has fed the concepts and ideas that Barrett has developed. There is a seamless quality to the show and that falls squarely on Saunders shoulders. Even the most abrupt musical entrances feel right, and there are several of those. And the show has given me a new favorite Presley song, "Fools Fall in Love" the ten o’clock number sung by Natalie (a ten o’clock song is usually the next to closing, emotional, powerhouse tune you can’t forget).

          Eric Franzen’s costumes are reminiscent of the period and nicely used on stage in this production. Kevin Gleason’s set and lighting are excellent and the sound design by Rachel Neubauer worked so well that she should be immediately hired for all of next season. Michael Dunn’s wigs were perfectly period and bizarrely natural.

          How Saunders could pull this show off in the limited time the theater has to rehearse a large show like this one is a mystery. While the young cast is obviously multi-talented the responsibility of getting everything right falls on Saunders who seems to have his ways of doing it right when he wants to. With this show he clearly wanted to.

          All Shook Up is how I felt when I left the theater. I was dancing a bit, and singing a bit and altogether having too nice a time for a September evening. This season-ender is a feel-good hit and worth every dime and every moment you invest in the experience. "It’s Now or Never" if you want  "A Little Less Conversation" and care to "Follow That Dream." So "Don’t Be Cruel," "Let Yourself Go." I trust that like me you "Can’t Help Falling in Love With. . ." this wonderful musical evening.

◊09/7/13◊

All Shook Up plays through September 15 at the Mac-Haydn Theatre at 1925 State Route 203 in Chatham, NY. For information and tickets call the box office at 518-392-9292 or go on line to www.machaydntheatre.org.

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