November 2023

The Faith of a Child that the World was Good and Right and True

Family Matters: Drawings by Tucker Goodman, the art exhibition at Taproot Theatre shares the theme of “family” with the Christmas show, Georgiana & Kitty: Christmas at Pemberley. The trilogy Christmas at Pemberly is all about how the Bennets and the Darcys blend their families into one clan, while Family Matters was inspired by a collection of old and new family photos, which inspired Goodman to transpose these photographic images into less realistic but more expressive black and white drawings.

Cats is the fifth longest running Broadway show. It is about a group of felines called the Jellicles. They all have vibrant personalities and quirky reputations, like Rum Tum Tugger the flirt, and Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer, who are a crime duo. All the Jellicles have gathered for the night of the Jellicle Ball, where the patriarch Old Deuteronomy will decide which Jellicle will go to the Heaviside Layer, their version of heaven. Cats is comprised of high energy musical numbers which serve to introduce the characters to the audience and for the characters to entertain Old Deuteronomy. Cats is written and composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber and is based on the 1939 poetry collection Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats by T.S. Elliot.

Cats

Last Play in the Sequel to Pride and Prejudice.

Georgiana & Kitty, the last play of the trilogy Christmas at Pemberley by Lauren Gunderson and Margot Melcon, opened at Taproot Theatre last night. Previously Taproot produced Miss Bennett in 2018 and last year The Wickhams. Although fictionalized, The Wickhams honored Jane Austen by delivering not only wit and humor but also morality and character development. Georgiana & Kitty was disappointing in that it lacked the underlying seriousness of a Jane Austen novel.

Last weekend, at the beautiful Bagley Wright Theatre, Seattle Rep debuted its modern adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s original coming-of-age novel, Little Women. At the time of its release, Alcott’s novel about the magnanimous Marches, a family of four young and exceptional women, was an immediate success, marking a cultural turning point for stories written by and about women. Seattle Rep’s production of this notorious nineteenth-century novel, adapted by playwright Kate Hamill and directed by Marti Lyons, emphatically reminds us why Little Women still resonates so deeply with audiences even today. Their fresh and inspiring take on the novel remains true to the source material’s heart while offering a compassionate perspective that liberates the story from its own temporal binds.