Obctheater

OBCTHEATER partnered with the City of Corona for a drive through Halloween experience

We were grieved to hear of the passing of Paul Del Real. We had the privilege to work with Paul on multiple shows. He was a wonderfully sweet man who impacted the lives of all he came in contact with and he will be greatly missed by all of his Obct family.

Did you know? Based on a John Collier (Twilight Zone)short story, Evening Primrose was made for a show called ABC Stage 67, which was a one-season program that aired variety shows, plays, musicals, and documentaries. At this time, Sondheim was collaborating with writer James Goldman on what would become the classic, Follies. Goldman’s wife was pregnant and they needed a larger apartment and so he convinced Sondheim to join him on this little project. And lo, Evening Pr...imrose was born. Evening Primrose centers round Charles Snell, a poet who determines the real world has no place for him and so he decides to live rent-free in a massive metropolitan department store. He’ll hide during the day and do his writing at night. One night in and he realizes that he’s not the first to do this. In fact there’s a whole society of people who are pretending to be mannequins. Charles is accepted into their ranks, falls in love with a woman but is kept apart because she is said to be lower-class and has been forced to live in the bargain section of the basement. Their forbidden love blooms in the outdoor section, where the others never tread, but they are discovered, murdered, and turned into actual mannequins where they stand, posed indefinitely in the front window of the department store as husband and wife. Little fun trivia: The video recording of the production is available on Amazon-prime and YouTube. Due to the fact that this was being filmed in a real department store, after closing, the production was forced to squeeze their work into a very narrow window which meant the scenes were all shot in one take. The downside is that this makes these scenes feel a little bit like a soap opera. The upside is that this makes the musical numbers really stand out, both in staging and in content. For Sondheim’s 90th birthday concert earlier this year, one of Primrose’s most beautiful songs, I Remember reverberated off the tiled walls of soprano Laura Benanti’s bathroom. Crouched next to her bathtub she sang this beautiful song as part of the tribute to Sondheim and a perfect explanation of how we all feel about the current quarantines. The original cast featured Anthony Perkins (Psycho) and Charmian Carr (Sound of Music) Check out some clips from this rarely produced, musical gem! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=o-0OUDs9KRE https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8_wO-Cj9q9c https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MyU_41hobLg #musicaltheatermonday #musicaltriviamonday #obctheater

Did you know? Unlike what many think when they hear the word opera, Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance is a comical operetta written in English. Performed in English. In under two hours. It tells the tale of Frederic, whothanks to his nurse’s mistakewas apprenticed as a pirate rather than a pilot. At the end of his contract, he is reminded that he was apprenticed until his twenty-first birthdaya slight problem considering he was born on February 29. A man o...f duty, he decides to honor his contract which technically ends when he is 63. During the time The Pirates of Penzance was written, international copyright laws did not exist. EnglishmenGilbert and Sullivan’s previous workthe operetta H.M.S. Pinaforehad suffered many unauthorized performances in America. To ensure that The Pirates of Penzance would not be pirated the same way, the operetta had three first performances to establish copyright on both sides of the Atlantic. The first performance was on Dec. 30, 1879, at the Royal Bijou Theatre in Paignton, England. Solely intended to secure English copyright, the cast even used scripts during the scaled-down performance. The next day, the show opened at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City with Sullivan himself conducting. Allison Horsleyformer professor at the University of Denversaid, Legend has it that Sullivan left the completed score in London before his and Gilbert’s departure to America for the premiere, and rewrote it on the high seas. The final opening performance was on April 3, 1880, at the Opera Comique in London, after which the operetta remained in theaters for a year. #musicaltriviamonday #obctheater #coronatheater #obct

Camryn Hamm is a incredible actress and one of the sweetest people you will ever work with. She played Ariel in our production of The Little Mermaid and will be featured as Mabel in our next production of The Pirates of Penzance! Thank you Patrick Brien for featuring Camryn https://www.dailybulletin.com//jurupa-valley-actress-21-o/

Audrey is a valued member of OBCT’s company! Excited to see how she grows in college and to have her back with our company very soon! Thank you to Patrick Brien and the Press Enterprise for continuing to highlight the wonderful performers we have here in the Inland Empire! https://www.pe.com//riverside-actress-17-finds-joy-in-the/

Our Community Virtual Choir singing God Bless America! Thank you for your submissions and for celebrating the founding of our wonderful county with us! Happy 4th of July!

A Celebration of our country's founding featuring patriotic music and selections from 1776 the musical. Featuring Elise Burt, Rachel Chase, Paul Christensen, James Ellis, Kellen Ford, Camryn Hamm, Tyler Jenkins, Amanda Kalkanis and Patrick McIver

We are so grateful to everyone who has or currently serves this great country in all branches of the armed forces! Thank you! Don’t miss our entire Independence Day Celebration at 2pm today on our Facebook page!

Streaming NOW! You can still purchase a ticket to watch the streaming performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream! This will be available to view until July 12th - visit www.obctheater.com for tickets!

Streaming NOW! Email Links have been sent to all who purchased tickets to watch the streaming performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream! This will be available to view until July 12th - visit www.obctheater.com to purchase tickets!

Streaming NOW! Don’t miss this beautiful production of this hilarious play! Visit www.obctheater.com to purchase a ticket!

We have a few spaces left available for audition appointments! Submit via email or contact us for an appointment. Come join us for this hilarious show! www.obctheater.com