Life is WHere it Happens

I love seeing live renditions of Disney movies, like Aladdin when it rolled through San Diego a few months ago. I was equally excited to see Peter Pan as it came to town to close out this season of San Diego Broadway.

While the show takes on the same plot of Peter Pan flying into Wendy Darling’s room and taking her and her brothers, Michael and John, off to Neverland, the show’s approach is much more modern, much more racially inclusive, and fortunately much more gay.

“The first time you hear Mrs. Doubtfire’s voice, the very first hello on the phone is the moment I can feel the audience signing the permission slip for me to borrow the character for the evening,” says Rob McClure, who plays Daniel Hillard and Mrs. Doubtfire on the national run of the Mrs. Doubtfire musical.

As a kid, my two favorite Disney movies were Aladdin and The Lion King. With Aladdin especially, I was just as much a fan of the sequels as I was the original, and “A Whole New World” has always been one of my favorite Disney jams.

Needless to say, I was pretty stoked to catch the National Tour of Aladdin on Broadway here in San Diego, and was even fortunate enough to chat with one of the stars, Aaron Choi as Iago, prior to the show.

When you have to put on a show that lives up to the legend that is Michael Jackson, the pressure for perfection is on from jump. MJ: The Musical recently embarked on its first national tour in August 2023 after making its Broadway debut in December 2021, and everyone involved knows exactly how much expectation everyone has to nail it.

Fortunately, they understood the assignment and delivered exactly what they needed to and more.

I'm gonna rouge my knees and roll my stockings down… And all that jazz.

The national tour of Chicago has made its way to San Diego, and the show did not disappoint. Those who are familiar, however, will notice it’s not quite the same as what they’re used to, particularly when it comes to the set design and costumes.

Okay, hang on, I’m still caught up in the tornado that swept me out of the theater and smacked me in the face with one of the most amazing live performances I’ve ever had the fortune of seeing in my life.

All right, now that I’ve picked my jaw up off of the ground, let’s talk about the current national production of The Wiz.

I had mixed emotions heading into the San Diego Civic Theater’s national production of Mamma Mia. I was excited because Abba was one of my father’s favorite bands, and having lost him recently, it felt good to do something I felt honored in his memory. Having a local actress, Alisa Melendez, in a starring role as Sophie Sheridan was also exciting, and I couldn’t wait to see her blow her hometown house down.

What I was nervous about, however, was the fact I hated the movie.

Ever since I saw Black Swan, I get overwhelmed every time I see a live dance and think about what the dancer has had to go through to get to this moment under the spotlight. When the girls do point and I think about their crumpled toes standing on top of wooden blocks within their shoes, I cringe and experience empathy pains as I imagine their cracked and bleeding toenails.

But I’ll be damned if they don’t look good while they’re doing it.

There’s a lot going on in Les Mis, and with the source material being over 1,000 pages long, it’s easy to see how the stories can get so complicated as they weave together. That said, there’s also a reason this show is so timeless, and the production of it at the San Diego Civic Theater was nothing short of a masterclass in how live theater should be done.

Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetle—

Okay, hang on a second, I’m getting a little ahead of myself.

Beetlejuice: The Musical (The Musical, The Musical) has officially hit San Diego on its national tour, and the mind trip of fun that took up the three-hour runtime was an awesome deep-dive into the themes and storyline from the original movie it’s based on.

Red, White & Royal Blue is the gay rom-com I never knew I needed.

I was a little hesitant going into this one, in all honesty. I haven’t read the book, written by Casey McQuinston and bearing the same name, but I heard it was really explicit in the language and sexual content department. I’m all here for that, but I guess I was expecting more 50 Shades of Gay and less 10 Things I Hate About You in the final delivery.

After the lights flickered their final call to usher the eager guests to their seats, the ethereal drumbeat of “Etherland — Sound of Mystic Law” started trembling as the curtains opened, and a group of people surrounded a grown Tina Turner, who sat with her back faced away from the audience.

The chant is later revealed to be a Buddhist mantra that played a pivotal role in Turner’s life, which we quickly learned was full of hurt, abuse, and betrayal.