{"id":22180,"date":"2016-11-22T07:44:09","date_gmt":"2016-11-22T12:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=22180"},"modified":"2016-11-22T07:44:15","modified_gmt":"2016-11-22T12:44:15","slug":"on-stage-bonus-an-american-in-paris-hits-philly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=22180","title":{"rendered":"On Stage (Bonus): An American in Paris hits Philly"},"content":{"rendered":"

Also: Thanksgiving Eve rocks out at TLA<\/em><\/h2>\n

By Denny Dyroff<\/strong>,\u00a0<\/span>Staff Writer, The Times<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>

An American in Paris<\/p><\/div>\n

If you\u2019re looking for a great way to spend an evening during this holiday week, a tantalizing option is to attend the Philadelphia debut of the national tour of a Tony-winning musical\u00a0which is on the road for the first time ever. From November 22-27, the Academy of Music (Broad and Locust streets, Philadelphia, 215-731-3333, www.kimmelcenter.org<\/i><\/span><\/a>) will host a special run of the hit musical \u201cAn American in Paris.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAn American in Paris\u201d was inspired by the 1951 Academy Award-winning film of the same name. The musical version opened at the Palace Theatre on Broadway in April 2015, following an engagement at the Th\u00e9\u00e2tre du Ch\u00e2telet in Paris.<\/span><\/p>\n

The show received 10 Tony Award nominations \u2013 including Best Musical, Best Actor in a Musical, Best Actress in a Musical and Best Book of a Musical. It won the Tony Awards in four categories \u2013 Best Choreography, Best Lighting Design of a Musical, Best Orchestrations and Best Scenic Design of a Musical.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the tour\u2019s Facebook page, \u201cAn American in Paris\u201d is a \u201cromantic story of a young American soldier, a beautiful French girl and an indomitable European city, each yearning for a new beginning in the aftermath of war\u201d and \u201cthe kind of new Broadway musical you thought they didn\u2019t make anymore\u2014a musical filled with beauty, artistry and the unmistakable beat of the human heart.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The talented cast of the national tour features Garen Scribner as Jerry Mulligan (American soldier\/protagonist), Sara Esty as Lise Dassin (French ballerina), Etai Benson as Adam Hochberg (composer\/fellow veteran) and Nick Spangler as Henri Baurel (Jerry\u2019s French friend).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis tour has been out about three weeks,\u201d said Benson, during a phone interview a week ago from a tour stop in Buffalo, New York. \u201cIt opened in Boston a few weeks ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI first auditioned for \u2018An American in Paris\u2019 four years ago when they were putting together a workshop for the Broadway production. I sent them a videotape and they liked it. I was called back for several more auditions but didn\u2019t get the role.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe show opened on Broadway and became a big hit. When they announced auditions for the national tour, I called my agent and said to him \u2013 I want that part (Adam Hochberg). I auditioned and the director even remembered my tape from before. The rest is history because here I am.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI had seen the show on Broadway. My roommate was in the original Broadway company and I saw it twice. Then, I saw it again when they took the cast of the national tour to see the show on Broadway. It just closed in New York last month.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur two leads in the touring company \u2013 Garen and Sara \u2013 come from the Broadway cast. They were asked by the director to head the national tour. It\u2019s cool to have them here. They\u2019re really great leaders.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The musical version of the story stands on its own.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe way we describe our show is that it is inspired by the film,\u201d said Benson, who majored in music theater at the University of Michigan. \u201cIt\u2019s not just the film slapped on stage. The director and the book writer wanted to give it a little more dramatic weight that the film \u2013especially with my role and Henri\u2019s role. They\u2019ve really added complexity to these characters. The book writer changed it from Paris in the 1950s to Paris in 1945 immediately after the liberation. He fleshed out the characters.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe show looks at what happened after a period of darkness \u2013 how the people and the city came out of that darkness \u2013 how joy, hope and love can bring us out of darkness. My character is an ex-G.I. who stays in Paris and is trying to be a composer. When he finds Lise, she gives him inspiration to write music. The movie had technicolor and cheerful optimism \u2013 and we have that too. People who love the film are going to love this show.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe had two full months of rehearsal and that\u2019s a long time. The technical elements are so complex. All the set changes are transitioned to music. The director\u2019s vision included the set. The set changes are just as choreographed as anything in the show.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

With a great story, talented acting, lively choreography and great music, the show overflows with audience appeal.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAudiences love this show because it is a visual feast,\u201d said Benson. \u201cThe choreography is unlike anything I\u2019ve ever seen on stage. The level of the dance is really high. There are entire scenes that play out without words. The story is told through dance. And there is the Gershwin music \u2013 songs that people know and love.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The music in the show, which was created by George and Ira Gershwin, features such timeless classics as songs \u201cI Got Rhythm,\u201d \u201c\u2018S Wonderful,\u201d \u201cBut Not for Me,\u201d \u201cStairway to Paradise\u201d and \u201cThey Can\u2019t Take That Away.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnother reason people really love his show is that it is aesthetically pleasing,\u201d said Benson. \u201cIt\u2019s romantic, it\u2019s really funny and it\u2019s touching. And, we ask audiences to confront some big decisions. You will leave the heater humming a song — and thinking.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Video link for \u201cAn American in Paris\u201d \u2013 https:\/\/youtu.be\/5Omefn67Hxg?t=3<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The play will run from November 22-27 with shows at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday and Thursday and 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. There will also be matinees on Wednesday and Sunday at 2 p.m. and Saturday at 2 p.m. Ticket prices range from $20-$130.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Blessthefall\"<\/a>

Blessthefall<\/p><\/div>\n

On Thanksgiving Eve (November 23), there will be a mega-show at the Theatre of the Living Arts (334 South Street, Philadelphia, 215-222-1011, http:\/\/www.lnphilly.com<\/i><\/span><\/a>) \u2013 \u201cCrown The Empire: The Retrograde Tour\u201d featuring Blessthefall, New Years Day, Too Close To Touch, Light Up The Sky and Crown the Empire.<\/span><\/p>\n

Blessthefall \u2013 Beau Bokan (lead vocals), Eric Lambert (guitar), Jared Warth (bass\/vocals), Matt Traynor (drums), Elliott Gruenberg (guitar) — is touring in support of its most recent album \u201cTo Those Left Behind.\u201d The album, which came out on Fearless Records, debuted at #15 on the Billboard Top 200 when it was released.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe album has been out for over a year,\u201d said Bokan, during a phone interview last week form a tour stop in Pittsburgh. \u201cNow, we can ease out of that support tour with a long tour opening for Crown the Empire. It feels good to play in front of new faces.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Blessthefall is a metal\/hardcore band that was formed in 2004 in Arizona. The hard-hitting quintet has released five albums \u2013 one every other year since 2007. They are \u201cHis Last Walk\u201d (2007), \u201cWitness\u201d (2009), \u201cAwakening\u201d (2011), \u201cHollow Bodies\u201d (2013) and \u201cTo Those Left Behind\u201d (2015).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe definitely are the heaviest band on this tour,\u201d said Bokan. \u201cWe sort of have more of a metal vibe but we throw in some of our lighter songs. We give the audience some heavy and some light.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

During the summer, Blessthefall was one of the heaviest bands on the Vans Warped Tour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the same with the Warped Tour with audiences,\u201d said Bokan. \u201cThe Warped Tour has been adding son poppy bands. It\u2019s such an eclectic group of musicians. We\u2019ve done the warped Tour four times. When kids go to Warped, they can walk around and hear a whole spectrum of music. We got new fans with every set we played on the tour.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

With the release of \u201cTo Those Left Behind,\u201d Blessthefall moved to a whole new level of creativity \u2013 sonically and emotionally.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe recorded the album in Manchester, Michigan with Joey Sturgis,\u201d said Bokan. \u201cHe lives out in the middle of nowhere. That recording session feels like a lifetime ago. I did a lot of the voice tracks with Erik Ron. I flew out to L.A. to work with him. He\u2019s helped come up with some crazy melodies.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Having established a pattern of releasing an album in every odd year, Blessthefall knows what is expected from the band in 2017.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI love \u2018To Those Left Behind\u2019 and right now our set list consists of the last two records,\u201d said Bokan. \u201cNow, I\u2019m excited about writing a new album. After this, we don\u2019t know what\u2019s coming next. We might change things up a bit.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to start writing until we feel creative \u2013 and that time is starting to come. We\u2019re getting into that space. We already have three or four scratch demos that we\u2019re playing with right now.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Video link for Blessthefall \u2013 https:\/\/youtu.be\/ESG3k-vq_HQ?t=5<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The show at TLA, which also features New Years Day, Too Close To Touch, Light Up The Sky and Crown the Empire, will start at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $18.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another band that records for Fearless Records will be playing in Philadelphia on November 23 when Real Friends performs at Fillmore Philadelphia (1100 Canal Street, Philadelphia, 215-309-0150, www.thefillmorephilly.com<\/i><\/span><\/a>).<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Real<\/a>

Real Friends<\/p><\/div>\n

When Chicago-based Real Friends\u00a0–Kyle Fasel- bass; Dave Knox- guitar; Dan Lambton- vocals; Brian Blake- drums; Eric Haines- guitar — \u00a0played in Philly in the spring, they were on a cross-country tour where tickets are only $5. They wanted to give their fans a chance to see their energetic live show in an intimate and unique setting — for a low price.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Fasel, \u201cWe thought this would not only be a fun experience for our fans, but for the band as well. We want to create an experience that no one will forget. It\u2019s a shot at us taking things back to our roots a little bit. The $5 tour was just an idea we had where our fans could see us play in a small setting with a $5 ticket.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Real Friends has always had a blue-collar vibe.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just a product of being in local bands in Chicago and meeting each other,\u201d said Fasel. \u201cIt\u2019s not a huge story. It was a natural way for the band to start. We formed the band in 2010. We actually recorded before we played our first shows. We felt it was important to have music to sell at the shows. If fans like what they hear being played on stage, they want to have music to take home with them. We had our first EP out before we ever played a show.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Real Friends is now touring in support of its sophomore album \u201cThe Home Inside My Head,\u201d which was released a few months ago. The band put out its debut album \u201cMaybe This Place Is The Same And We’re Just Changing\u201d in 2014. The band is currently on tour with The Wonder Years, following a whirlwind summer on the Main Stage of the Vans Warped Tour.\u00a0The 31-date tour kicked off on October 15.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe did the Warped Tour all summer and that was a great opportunity to get out to the masses,\u201d said Fasel in last week\u2019s phone interview. \u00a0\u201cIt really helped get our songs out there. And, Warped Tour is always a good time but it\u2019s the hardest tour to do. It toughens the skin.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in Atlanta now. Philly is our last date then it\u2019s home sweet home. We recorded the new album in January and February in California \u2013 L.A. and Garden Grove. We recorded with Steve Ebbetts in his studio and did three tracks with Mike Green. We did a week of pre-production with Steve and we were really prepared.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWith the new songs, we\u2019ve taken a more natural progression into the band we want to be. Some songs have a poppy aspect. We widened our influences. But, we still always maintain that mentality we built in with the pop-punk genre.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we did the pre-production, it was all of us un a room together. Then, we recorded tracks separately when we were actually making the album. We spent more than a year writing for the album. It was a tough time deciding which songs to put on the album.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe had more songs than we needed. We were in the studio for five weeks We used two songs as extra tracks on a Target release. Fearless has done a lot of releases through Target stores. It\u2019s really cool because it\u2019s mainstream.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Video link for Real Friends — https:\/\/youtu.be\/uPqho1yuos0?t=5<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The show at Fillmore Philadelphia (1100 Canal Street, Philadelphia, 215-309-0150, www.thefillmorephilly.com<\/span><\/a>), which also features The Wonder Years, Knuckle Puck, Moose Blood, Seaway, will start at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $25.<\/span><\/p>\n

Other shows over the next few days at Fillmore Philadelphia are Party Next Door & Jeremith on November 20, and K. Flay and Nightly on November 22.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Also: Thanksgiving Eve rocks out at TLA By Denny Dyroff,\u00a0Staff Writer, The Times\u00a0 If you\u2019re looking for a great way to spend an evening during this holiday week, a tantalizing option is to attend the Philadelphia debut of the national tour of a Tony-winning musical\u00a0which is on the road for the first time ever. From […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22182,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7529],"tags":[8237,8238,6518,7254],"class_list":["post-22180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-d-arts-entertainment","tag-an-american-in-paris","tag-bless-the-fall","tag-featured","tag-real-friends"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22180"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22181,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22180\/revisions\/22181"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}