[MD Theatre Guide] Theatre Review: ’42nd Street’ at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts
In the Hollywood-musical-turned-Broadway show ”42nd Street,” Peggy Sawyer, a young girl from Allentown, PA, dreams of being in a New York Broadway show in the theatre district of 42nd Street. The show fluctuates between the challenges she faces as a Broadway newcomer, her interactions with various people she meets in show business, and her unexpected triumphs towards stardom. It is a show within a show since most of the musical numbers are part of the fictional musical, “Pretty Lady.”
[MD Theatre Guide] Theatre Review: ‘Ragtime’ at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts
Riverside Center for the Performing Arts in Fredericksburg, VA is celebrating its twenty-fifth anniversary. It is including some very special shows this year, including the current production of “Ragtime: The Musical,” based on the novel by E.L. Doctorow.
[MD Theatre Guide Review] ‘Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner’ at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts
Many dinner theatres run primarily on popular musicals. Patrick A’Hearn, producer of Riverside Center for the Performing Arts in Fredericksburg, Virginia, challenges this trend by presenting at least one non-musical production per year. His selection this year is “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner,” a bold choice in spite of being based on an award-winning film from 1967.
[Prince George's Sentinel] ‘Leapin’ lizards!’ A swell ‘Annie’ with heart
…The world now knows and loves “Little Orphan Annie” simply as “Annie,” the eternally optimistic (and pro-Roosevelt!) red-headed protagonist of the stage musical and subsequent film franchise.
Just as we briefly returned above to the comic pages of yore, Director Patrick A’Hearn returns the musical to its original version, for – like the comic-strip character herself – the show “Annie” has been revised many times since the character’s first appearance on Broadway in 1977.
What A’Hearn found missing in post-1977 versions was heart, he told us, and that he restores in full measure in his production currently playing at the Riverside Center for the Performing Arts in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
[Prince George's Sentinel] An Enchanted Evening with 'South Pacific'
“I wish I could tell you about the South Pacific. The way it actually was. The endless ocean. The infinite specks of coral we called islands. Coconut palms nodding gracefully toward the ocean. Reefs upon which waves broke into spray, and inner lagoons, lovely beyond description.”
So begins James Michener’s “Tales of the South Pacific,” the book which was the inspirational source of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic musical “South Pacific.”
The challenge of this musical was to combine visual beauty with the horror of war while sprinkling in elements of romantic comedy.
The Riverside Center for the Performing Arts production, masterfully directed by and choreographed by Penny Ayn Maas and produced by Patrick A’Hearn, succeeds in weaving these delicate threads of the music together and is complemented with an outstanding cast and brilliant singing and musical numbers.
Prince George's Sentinel: A Harmonious 'Chorus Line' at Riverside Center Dinner Theater
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. – “The show was the ‘Hamilton’ of its day.” Thus Patrick A’Hearn, Riverside Center for the Performing Arts producing artistic director, gives his production of “A Chorus Line,” a reference point for today’s audience.