Think of the Broadway musical, its past, present or future, and any number of phrases may spring to mind, depending on your affection for this embattled but persistent form of popular entertainment.
Differences as it expanded
“Spring Awakening” has changed in small ways and improved in large ones since it opened last summer Off Broadway at the Atlantic Theater Company. It has moved further away from the Wedekind play, but only scholars are likely to care that a key plot turn, a sex scene with the central female character, the pubescent Wendla Bergman (Lea Michele), has been thoroughly softened from confused ambiguity into a consensual act.Stephen Spinella and Christine Estabrook now play the roles of various adults, from sympathetic to snarlingly repressive. If their Boris-and-Natasha act as a pair of conniving schoolmasters is a little overripe, they are effective as the less villainous members of the parental class.
Ticket info
Dates: October 13-18
Kansas City Music Hall
Price ranging from $71-$300
Rights to the musical
Music Theatre International owns the rights to Spring awakening but they may
not be releasing the show for regional and high schools soon. Many shows they
have had for a while like hairspray and les miserables have only recently started
being released for regional shows
