Another of this summer's major festivals - the Utah Musical Theatre series in Ogden - opens the first of its four Broadway musicals this weekend. The Utah Shakespearean Festival also officially opens on Monday in Cedar City (see separate story), and both the Old Lyric Repertory and Sundance Musical Theatre companies open their second shows.
The regional premiere of the British comedy, "Run For Your Wife," a Park City Performances production at the historic Egyptian Theatre, is also on tap, along with a City Rep musical revue and a Pages Lane Theatre children's production.
- RUN FOR YOUR WIFE, a wild British farce in the "Noises Off" mode by Ray Cooney, has its regional premiere on Friday, July 2.
Directed by Toni Byrd, it's about a taxi driver who is juggling two wives. Following a mugging accident, he inadvertently gives one address to the people at the hospital and the other address to the police - forcing him to come up with an elaborate lie.
The Park City Performances cast includes Larry Webb, Christine Woodward, Jonathan Stowers, LuAnne Smith, Holly Claspill and Jon Clarke.
Performances in the historic Egyptian Theatre, 328 Main St., Park City, will be Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m. from July 2 through Sept. 11. (There will be NO performances Aug. 5-7 due to the Park City Arts Festival.) No matinees are scheduled.
Admission is $15 for adults, $12 for students and senior citizens, and $10 for children. For reservations or further information, contact the PCP box office at 649-9371.
- A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM, the zany musical from the team of Burt Shevelove, Larry Gelbart and Stephen Sondheim, opens Saturday, July 3, on the outdoor Eccles Mainstage of the Sundance Summer Theatre.
Directed by John Caywood, "A Funny Thing . . . " is the theatrical marriage of Roman comedy and madcap vaudeville.
The cast includes David Spencer as Pseudolus, a roguish slave to a Roman family who uses his young master, Hero (David Tinney) in a scheme to gain his freedom; Charles Metton as Senex, Hero's befuddled father; Sam Stewart as Hysterium, another slave, and Laurie Koralewski as Philia, an attractive virgin in the House of Marcus Lycus, whom Hero secretly worships from his bedroom window.
The show contains such rollicking songs as "Comedy Tonight" and "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid."
Brent Schneider is choreographing the production.
Following its opening on Saturday, "A Funny Thing . . . " will continue on odd-numbered calendar dates through Sept. 3, alternating with "Guys and Dolls" (which will play on even-numbered nights). No Sunday performances. Admission ranges from $8 to $15. Group and senior citizens discounts are available. For reservations, call 225-4100 (Provo).
- FIDDLER ON THE ROOF: Like "Oklahoma" 20 years before, this 1964 musical had many theater industry people fearing it was doomed to fail because it had no pretty dancing girls, no pretty scenery and a not particularly happy ending.
What it did have, however, was a compelling story and a beautiful score - and a blockbuster performance by Zero Mostel as beleaguered dairy farmer Tevya. Rather than becoming a box office flop, "Fiddler" received global acclaim and today ranks as one of the all-time Broadway classics.
Duane Stephens, seen most recently in such local hits as "Greater Tuna" and "Salt Lake Salt Lake" (both for Salt Lake Acting Company), is returning for his fifth season with Weber State University's prestigious "summer stock" lineup, the Utah Musical Theatre series.
"Fiddler" kicks off a 15-performance run in the Allred Theatre of WSU's Val A. Browning Center for the Performing Arts on Friday, July 2. (It will actually premiere the night before at a by-invitation-only gala, but public performances don't begin until Friday.)
Guest director Tom Henschel of California has a cast that includes Lori Schoonmaker as busybody matchmaker Yente; Rosemary O'Brien as Golde, Tevye's wife; Alisa Harris, Erika Macleod and Heidi Fredericks as their three elder daughters (all defying "Tradition!" by wanting to choose their own husbands); and Jeffrey Wolf, Steven Sater, Justin Bank and Scott Neilson as the girls' suitors.
Dean Winter, Jim Felt, Justin Ivie and Brad Schroeder also have leading roles in the show.
Performances will be Friday and Saturday, July 2-3 and Mondays-Saturdays, July 5-10 and 12-17, all at 7:30 p.m., with one matinee scheduled for 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 10.
The rest of the 1993 Utah Musical Theatre slate includes "Pump Boys and Dinettes," running July 9-Aug. 28 in the intimate Monson Theatre, and "Peter Pan" (July 23-Aug. 7) and "West Side Story" (Aug. 13-28) all in the upstairs Allred Theatre.
For reservations, contact the Dee Events Center ticket office at 626-8500. Tickets are also available at WSU's Shepherd Union Building, the Thornton Community Center at Hill AFB, the Golden Spike Arena box office and at Ogden City Mall.
- THE RAINMAKER, the second of the Old Lyric Repertory Company's five plays this season, was the first Lyric production seen by OLRC director Colin Johnson when he arrived in Logan nearly 20 years ago to join the Utah State University theater faculty.
"There is always room for a classic show like this in the repertory season," he said.
The romantic comedy, first presented on Broadway in 1954 with Geraldine Page and filmed in 1956 with Burt Lancaster and Katharine Hepburn, "is not about the Depression or the Oklahoma dust bowl - it's about dreams, about how one strikes a balance between the necessity of having dreams and not falling into the trap of succumbing to them or living in them," said Johnson.
The cast includes Lisa R. Wilson as Lizzie, Kurt Johnson as Starbuck, the smooth-talking "rain maker" who enters her life, and Equity actor Jesse Bennett of Salt Lake City as Lizzie's father, H.C. Curry.
Other players are Jim Weber, Stuart Lewis and Fred Willecke.
Playdates are July 1-3, 9-10, 21 & 31 and Aug. 11, all at 8 p.m., with a matinee at 2 p.m. on July 31 at the historic Lyric Theatre, 28 W. Center St. Admission is $8 for adults, $7 for senior citizens, USU faculty/staff and children, and $6 for USU students with valid I.D. For reservations (credit card only) call 750-1657.
- HOORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD, City Rep's celebration of the famous songs from the movies of the 1930s, '40s and '50s, will run for four performances July 1-31.
Part of the company's "theatrical concert" series, this production was postponed last summer due to City Rep's move (and subsequent remodeling project) into its new facility at 638 S. State.
James Dale, Pegeen Smith, Marci Wynn, Ann Rawlins, Angela Maloy, Wanda Copier, Ron Jewett, Dan Morgan, Bryon Finch and Dennis Lee will be in the ensemble, performing medleys of some of the best tunes from great Hollywood musicals and theme songs from other films.
Included will be music from "Singin' in the Rain," "Lili," "Meet Me in St. Louis," "Funny Girl," "Breakfast at Tiffany's," "Grease," "Bye Bye Birdie," "The Little Shop of Horrors" and "The Wizard of Oz."
Playdates are Thursday, July 1; Thursday & Friday, July 15-16, and Saturday, July 31, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $8.50 for adults and $6 for children (16 and under). All seats are reserved. For tickets, call the City Rep box office at 532-6000.
- I'LL REMEMBER YOU, a comedy by Ruth and Nathan Hale, is the next production being presented at the rustic Hale Summer Playhouse on the Hale family's ranch near Grover (in the Capitol Reef area of southern Utah).
Performances are Friday, July 2, at 8 p.m., and Saturday, July 3, at both 4 and 8 p.m.
For reservations call 572-5070 in the Salt Lake City area earlier in the week, or call the ranch in Grover (425-3589) on performance days.
- THE WIZARD OF OZ, which was originally scheduled to open July 3 at the Pages Lane Theater in Centerville, has been shifted to the weekend of July 10.