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Ivy + Bean The Musical book, music and lyrics by Scott Elmegreen
based on the books by Annie Barrows
illustrated by Sophie Blackall
directed by Marya Mazor JULIANNE ARGYROS STAGENovember 7, 2013 - November 24, 2013
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Ivy is all about ideas; she loves to read. Bean is all about action; she loves to be the center of attention. How could these two second-graders become inseparable friends? Just wait! When they get together, the result is mischief, occasional chaos and non-stop laughter. Along the way, hidden within their plotting and planning, are wonderful lessons about friendship and family. Previews: November 8-15, 2013
Regular Performances: November 16-24, 2013 Recommendation: Theatre for Young Audiences … and Their Families is just that, a multi-generational experience for all ages (except children under the age of four and babes-in-arms). The only requirement is that each audience member occupies a seat and sits quietly through the performance while having a wonderful time. Scott Elmegreen is a writer and composer whose work has premiered on Broadway and television, as well as off-Broadway, regionally and internationally. In addition to Awesome Allie, First Kid Astronaut, his shows include Magic School Bus, Live! The Climate Challenge (music and lyrics; national tour), Thucydides (Samuel French Off Off Broadway Festival winner), College The Musical (New York Musical Theatre Festival Award for Excellence; Richard Rodgers Award finalist), Vote For Me: A Musical Debate (New York Musical Theatre Festival), and Straight (developed by Tony Award-winning producer Andy Sandberg). Elmegreen has scored numerous plays including Colin Quinn Long Story Short, directed by Jerry Seinfeld (Helen Hayes; HBO; national tour), What I Took In My Hand (Ontological-Hysteric Incubator; Brick Theater), Daguerreotype (Abingdon Theater), We Can’t Reach You, Hartford (Fringe First nomination), and Joyce Carol Oates’ Tone Clusters (Fringe Report Award, Best Play), and he has orchestrated ‘S Wonderful: The New Gershwin Musical (national tour) and others. Elmegreen is also a published author of young adult fiction. He is a graduate of Princeton University. Learn more about the production, cast & creative team with a peek into the program. Read full artist bios, in-depth articles and more. Cast
| | Melody Butiu as Mom/Sophie W., Hello, everyone! The last time I was on this stage, I played Junie B. in Junie B. Jones in Jingle Bells, Batman Smells! I studied theatre in college and graduate school at the University of California, San Diego. I spent the first half of this year singing and dancing in a crazy-fun disco musical by David Byrne (most grownups know him from the band, the Talking Heads) called Here Lies Love at The Public Theater in New York City. When I did Shipwrecked! An Entertainment at SCR, I played a mother, a sea captain, a native girl named Yamba and an octopus expert, all in one play! I also played a mechanical genius flying-robot creator in The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow. I've done shows across the country and even around the world. My next adventure is to ride an elephant when I travel to Thailand in December to perform in the musical, Land of Smiles. On TV, you might have seen me in "Raising Hope," "NCIS," "Modern Family," "Rules of Engagement" and "Melissa & Joey." Thank you, Alan, for your love and support.
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| | | Dylan DoVale as Leo, I love sports. Really. I played soccer, baseball, basketball, even chess as I was growing up. Later cross-country and track seemed to be my thing. I love competition and my favorite sports team in the world is the New York Yankees. When I'm not busy being physical or practicing firebending (Did I just say firebending!? Yes I did!) or hanging out with friends, I read. Some of my favorite books include "Sword in the Stone," "The Hobbit," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," "Sherlock Holmes," "Harry Potter," "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" and, of course, "Tintin." My favorite subject in school is history and I did not like math. At all. A big thank you to some of my fave teachers: Steve Buckley, Jim Proehl, Jim Sylvester, Sifu Kisu, Chuck Mclauchlin, Ellen Howard. Teachers care about you kids, even when they give you tests. |
| | | Emily Eiden as Nancy/Zuzu, Hello again! You might remember me from SCR's Anastasia Krupnik, Junie B. in Jingle Bells, Batman Smells! and A Year with Frog and Toad—or your parents may have seen me here in Taking Steps. Acting in great stories like these is my family business. You see, my mom and dad met in a play directed by my grandpa; then my brother and I grew up acting in plays directed by my parents, and eventually, I met my husband in acting class! These days, I get to bring characters to life in stories on stage, screen, and even on your iPod! You can hear me tell stories in audiobooks like the "Whatever After" series, "A Dog's Way Home" and "Paranormalcy" or the Scholastic animated films Children Make Terrible Pets and Exclamation Mark. You might also recognize my voice in the Cartoon Network show, "Clarence"—or in the planetarium shows at Griffith Observatory. Please enjoy our story today! |
| | | William Martinez as Dad/Eric, I am thrilled to make my SCR debut with Ivy + Bean! Coming from a deaf household, I was never exposed to the entertainment industry until a theatre troupe came to my school and performed a show that changed my life. I instantly knew that I wanted to sing and act! I studied hard in my classes to get great grades so I could be in choir and theatre after school. I then pursued my college degree in Musical Theatre from the University of Northern Colorado and moved to Los Angeles. I have performed shows at the Mark Taper Forum (Big River), Laguna Playhouse (Plaid Tidings), Alex Theatre, TO Arts Plaza, Carpenter Center and many other theatres. I also give back to the school community by performing in four different kids shows: Page to Stage and The History of Musical Theatre for Musical Theatre Guild; Orchestra Intro with the New West Symphony; and We Tell Their Story with Musical Theatre West. I hope that bringing musical theatre to underprivileged schools will inspire others to follow their dreams, too. I am a proud member of Musical Theatre Guild and Actors Equity. Thanks to my wonderful father for his endless support and love.
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| | | Elia Saldana as Bean, I started out doing dance recitals dressed as a bear and singing Christmas carols for my dad's camcorder. Then I got schooled at a place called UCSD (the University of California, San Diego) and went on to have many acting adventures. You might have seen me as Kayla in Jane of the Jungle or Elisa in Anastasia Krupnik here at SCR! I also was married to a rock and roll star in Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story and toured all over the place. I got to dance a lot in West Side Story. I played a sassy girl in Family Planning, and even got nominated for a cool award called the Ovation. Recently I fulfilled my dream of voicing a cartoon character by playing Cecilia on Fox's "The Cleveland Show." I want to thank my family, friends, and Burl for their love and support. Never stop learning new things and follow your dreams!
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| | | Sammi Smith as Ivy, I am so excited to be playing Ivy! I grew up right down the road from South Coast Repertory in Irvine, where I went to Eastshore Elementary School. I decided I wanted to be an actor as a little girl when my Grandma Maxine took me to see plays at Downey Civic Light Opera. Last spring, I got to play many different characters in The Phantom Tollbooth at Main Street Theatre Company, including the roles of the Princess of Pure Reason and the Demon of Insincerity. My husband, Jeremy, and I run a theatre company in Los Angeles called Coeurage Theatre Company. We're currently performing Shakespeare's Love's Labour's Lost. Besides acting and singing, I love hiking, listening to audiobooks and spending time with my cat, Dot.
| | Creative Team | | Marya Mazor (Director) performed in her first play at age 4, then began acting in shows that toured in schools with her mother, a story-theater performer. As a high school student, she wrote a play that was part of the Young Playwrights Festival in New York, which introduced her to the professional theatre world. After college, she attended the Yale School of Drama where she received an MFA in directing. For 10 years, she ran a theatre in New York, Voice & Vision, that developed and produced plays by and about girls and women. She also has worked as a director of stage shows for the Disney Parks. Last year, Marya directed Aladdin for the Disney Cruise Lines, and got to cross the Atlantic Ocean while conducting technical rehearsals. She has directed plays at many regional theatres, including The Long Wharf Theatre, New York Stage & Film Company, the Chance Theater and Voice & Vision in New York. She also directed a short film, The Winged Man, featuring Ana Ortiz of "Ugly Betty, "written by playwright/screenwriter José Rivera (Motorcycle Diaries). She is the mother of two teenagers, Asa and Zelda. |
| | Alby Potts (Musical Director/Arranger) loves music. He began playing his first instrument in elementary school, and knew right away he wanted to be a professional musician. He played his first paying job in the eighth grade, and has been working ever since. Alby's first piano teacher taught lessons in her house, which her husband had built by hand around a gigantic tree. He made it out of found lumber, stones, and junk, and the tree trunk and lower branches were in the living room. She had two grand pianos and the roof leaked when it rained, but nobody seemed to mind. Alby wrote a piano concerto when he was 13 and his junior high music teacher, "RO", was great because he played it with the school orchestra. Teachers that encourage their students are the best! It makes a difference for the rest of your life, just like discipline and practicing. Enjoy the show! |
| | Ann Sheffield (Set Designer) is a teacher! She loves that her life path led her to the classroom again and that she gets to teach others about her field, set design. When she was younger, she didn't even realize she could put her love of storytelling together with her love of art. But voila! Here we are… While at Occidental College as an art major, she dabbled in all the arts. By singing in the school choir, she got to meet other students who were in the theatre department. Except for the occasional appearance in a musical, performing wasn't really her thing. However, a very nurturing professor suggested that she design the production of Hot L Baltimore. With that challenge, the whole world of design opened before her. She was lucky to continue her studies at the Yale School of Drama, working under renowned Professor Ming Cho Lee. After graduation in 1987, she lived and worked in New York, designing for various regional theatres and assisting Tony award-winning designer Tony Walton. Eventually, she made her way back to California and is currently a professor at Cal State Fullerton, where she tries to be as inspiring to her students as others have been to her. She hopes you enjoy Ivy+Bean as much as I've enjoyed working on it! |
| | Angela Balogh Calin (Costume Designer) is very excited to be back to SCR where she has designed costumes and/or sets for nine TYA shows and more than 35 other productions, including The Whale, Trip to Bountiful, Circle Mirror Transformation, Crimes of the Heart and Ordinary Days. She also designed sets and costumes for SCR's Educational Touring Productions from 1998 to 2008. Calin has designed more than 60 productions for Denver Center Theatre Company, A Noise Within Theatre, Milwaukee Rep., The Old Globe, Pasadena Playhouse, Georgia Shakespeare and many local theatres and in her native Romania. She has worked extensively in film and television in the U.S. and Romania, having design credits with I.R.S. Media, Cannon Films, PBS, Full Moon Entertainment and Romanian Films. She graduated with an MFA in set and costume design from the Academy of Arts in Bucharest |
| | Brian Gale (Lighting Designer) saw his first professional play at the Ahmanson Theater in 1972. It was Cyrano De Bergerac starring Richard Chamberlain. It spurred him to take a drama class, instead of shop, and he memorized the "Nose Speech" for his project. He wished he hadn't waited until high school to get the 'theater bug.' He is so happy you are starting earlier than he did! Gale's first professional lighting design was with SCR. He designed the lighting for Equus in 1978. The next year, he became a lighting designer for Disney. He designed Lighting for Fantasmic and Candlelight, as well as stage shows and parades at Disneyland. He continues to work for Disney on the Electrical Parade at Tokyo Disneyland and stage shows in Shanghai, the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood and many Disney movie premieres including Pirates of the Caribbean I thru V. |
| | Jeff Polunas (Sound Designer) is a Los Angeles-based sound designer. He attended Mt. San Jacinto and MiraCosta colleges and majored in music theory and recording. He decided to get back into theater, on a production of West Side Story, where he mixed a show for the first time. He then continued his education at San Diego State University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in theater. Jeff earned his MFA in sound design at UC-Irvine and looks forward to the opportunity to keep composing music and designing for theater and dance. Jeff is currently the production sound engineer for Cal State Fullerton's Department of Theatre and Dance. Jeff has designed for 10 different universities and colleges. This is his fourth sound design at SCR; he previously designed Anastasia Krupnik, Junie B Jones… Batman Smells! and Between Us Chickens. Jeff loves the challenge of creating original music. |
| | Kelly Todd (Choreographer) grew up in Los Angeles and started dancing seriously when she was 15, which is pretty late for a dancer. But, by the time she was 17, she was choreographing musicals and hasn't stopped since. She went to UCLA where she got a BA in theater and then spent many years teaching young people in Los Angeles and New York City. She moved to New York to train with some of the best dance teachers in the country, including Josh Bergasse, who was the choreographer of the TV show "SMASH." She is not new to the SCR family; previously she worked on two productions with the Summer Players, Suessical and Annie, and she will be choreographing The Light in The Piazza, which opens at SCR in January. She has been a proud resident artist at The Chance Theater in Anaheim for nine years. |
| | Kathryn Davies (Stage Manager) grew up in Nova Scotia, Canada, where she studied piano, ukulele, recorder and tap dance. Her parents took her to see a lot of shows and she decided to become a stage manager when she was in 12th grade. Her high school drama teacher, Mr. Drew, inspired her to do this. Throughout the years, she has studied French, Italian, German and Spanish, which also has helped her to work on big opera productions. She is very grateful to her parents for making her keep up with her music lessons because if she hadn't, she wouldn't be able to do what she does now. Today, Kathryn gets to work with amazingly creative actors, directors, designers, singers, musicians and film stars in several countries.
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From the Blog  Colorful and Heartfelt Thank Yous
Some of SCR's youngest playgoers recently attended free matinees of Ivy+Bean, The Musical. Within days, the thank-yous began arriving from the students. Here’s a sampling of their words and artwork.
read more  Making Friends with Ivy + Bean
They’re best friends, but so different: Ivy is quiet and likes to read; Bean is bold and attracts trouble. These opposites complement each other in Ivy+Bean: The Musical, based on the popular books by Annie Barrows.
read more More
HONORARY PRODUCERS MEDIA PARTNERS
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