Archive: Arts & Entertainment

The Kitchen Theatre Company will present an encore presentation of Rachel Lampert & Larry Pressgrove’s original musical TONY & THE SOPRANO, just in time for the holiday season.   This hit musical comedy from our 2005-06 Season will return to the Kitchen on November 20 and run through December 14.   TONY & THE SOPRANO is a musical valentine to opera, Italian food, and mothers that’s sure to please audiences of all ages.

The story takes place in the closely-knit neighborhood of Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. Thirty-five year old Tony fixes cars and still lives with his mother, Rose.   His life seems to be one dead end after another, and he’s not the only one who is feeling stuck.   His best friend Vinny is opening the restaurant of his dreams, but his new waitress Isabel keeps breaking plates, and a local mobster is breathing down his neck for his payback.   Latchkey kid Carol is adrift.  

But when Rose’s attic apartment is rented to Julliard music student Frances, everyone’s life begins to change. Opera wafting down from the top floor starts everyone singing their own lyrics to the classic melodies of Verdi, Mozart, Rossini and more. This delightful musical tale of changing lives and finding love attests that music is the food of love.

TONY & THE SOPRANO will run Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at the family-friendly time of 7:30pm with matinees on Saturdays at 2pm and Sundays at 4pm. The play is appropriate for everyone age 8 and above.

“I love when music and laughter fill the Kitchen Theatre, and comedy rules in this play,” says Rachel Lampert, Artistic Director of the Kitchen and book and lyric writer for TONY & THE SOPRANO.    “It’s been great fun to revisit the script and the score and add a few new things.   And to get this great cast back together is a joy!”

The original production featured a cast of local favorites, and nearly all of them will be back. Erica Steinhagen plays Frances with winning Midwestern charm and a beautiful soprano voice.   Her real-life husband Joey Steinhagen plays the good-natured but going nowhere Tony.   Susannah Berryman, fresh from her role as Winnie in Beckett’s HAPPY DAYS at the Kitchen, plays Tony’s worried Italian mother Rose.   Jessica Flood returns from her new home in Iowa to play the part of Isabel, a bad waitress with a mysterious secret.   Jesse Bush is Tony’s pal Vinny, and Robert DeLuca is the neighborhood heavy, Carmine.   They are joined by Kitchen newcomer Charlotte Senders, a 7th grader at Trumansburg Middle School, who is playing the part of Carol, and Sophie Potter, a 9th grader at Ithaca High School, who is the standby understudy for that role.

Rachel Lampert, also the Artistic Director of the Kitchen Theatre, is the author of PRECIOUS NONSENSE, an original musical featuring songs by Gilbert & Sullivan.   She has also written musicals for family audiences and several non-musical plays and adaptations.   Larry Pressgrove has served as music director of numerous Broadway tours and shows, including, most recently, title of show, for which he was also the arranger and performance pianist.   TONY & THE SOPRANO was the first collaboration between Lampert and Pressgrove.   Since then, the pair has written three other musicals:   THE ANGLE OF THE SUN, COMFORT FOOD, and BED NO BREAKFAST, all of which premiered at the Kitchen.   THE ANGLE OF THE SUN was chosen to be part of the 2007 New York Musical Theatre Festival, where it was performed with original cast member Jesse Bush and Broadway actress Amanda Watkins.

Music Director Richard Montgomery (BED NO BREAKFAST, COMFORT FOOD, PRECIOUS NONSENSE, THE ANGLE OF THE SUN) will be at the piano every night. Set design is by Dan Meeker (THE ANGLE OF THE SUN, TWO ROOMS), lighting design by E.D. Intemann (A MARRIAGE MINUET, THE TWO OF YOU) and costume design is by Jon Donk.   Preeti Nath is the stage manager.


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