Laguna Playhouse 2014-15 season: The day the music lived
Steve Steiner was standing in his parents’ kitchen when he heard the radio broadcast.
A plane crash in Clear Lake, Iowa, had taken the lives of musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson. It was Feb. 3, 1959, a time characterized in Don McLean’s song “American Pie” as “the day the music died.”
Steiner, then 8, recalled being deeply saddened by the news. He had been an ardent fan of The Big Bopper but, by his own admission, hadn’t come to fully appreciate the extent of Holly’s musical genius. That changed in 1990, when the New Jersey resident joined the Broadway company of “Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story.”
“His music is very, very accessible and really a lot of fun,” Steiner, 62, said of the musician who, with his signature hiccup and hits including “Peggy Sue,” “Oh, Boy!” and “That’ll Be The Day,” popularized rock culture and heavily influenced the Beatles, Rolling Stones and others.
“Buddy was really experimenting, especially just before he died. He was doing things in the studio that no artist was doing. It was all guitar bands in the ‘50s. And he was recording with strings and orchestras. Nobody in rock and roll did that.”
Steiner now directs “Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story,” a roughly 2 1/2-hour musical that will be presented at the Laguna Playhouse starting July 9. The show portrays Holly’s life in Lubbock, Texas, his association with record producer Norman Petty and a legendary performance with his band, the Crickets, at the Apollo Theater in Harlem.
The Laguna Beach venue, which recently announced its 2014-15 season, will also present actress Linda Purl in “The Year of Magical Thinking,” based on Joan Didion’s National Book Award-winning memoir about the loss of her husband, John Gregory Dunne. Additionally, actor, musician and playwright Hershey Felder, who has performed as George Gershwin, Beethoven and Chopin, will portray composer Irving Berlin, author of “God Bless America,” “White Christmas” and “There’s No Business Like Show Business.”
For Ann Wareham, artistic director of the Laguna Playhouse, everything begins with relationships. The Monarch Beach resident has committed her 30-year-plus career to creating and cementing long-standing alliances with actors, playwrights, designers, directors and others, to whom she often turns when trying to find the “best fare.”
“Sometimes, it’s about taking advantage of something that has caught fire elsewhere in the world,” she said. “It’s about getting in early and capturing something that you might lose if you wait too long.”
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Scouting the season
Wareham believes that programming a theater is a year-round responsibility — she only allows herself a part of July to decompress before starting work on the next season. Her duties take her to shows across California and even to Chicago, Seattle, New York City and elsewhere. Even if she’s vacationing, Wareham makes it a point to take in a production and support local artists, which, in turn, helps her unearth a wide cross-section of plays.
“I think that there are a lot of different ways to entertain,” she said. “Entertainment can be laugh-out-loud funny; it can be enlightening; it can be thought-provoking. Overall, I want a balanced season that has the most high-quality work we can bring in, with the most talented people we can bring here, and a variety — so musicals, comedy, drama — and the most interesting ways to present them.”
Wareham said anticipation is high for the Orange County premiere of “Murder for Two,” the off-Broadway hit in which one actor investigates the crime, the other takes on the roles of all the suspects, and they both play the piano.
The playhouse typically hosts six mainstage productions in a season, although only five have been determined so far for the coming year. The 420-seat space is also utilized for special events and community partnerships with Laguna Beach Live!, the Laguna Concert Band and Laguna Dance Festival.
The upcoming calendar includes two bonus performances: “The Magic of Motown,” featuring music by the Four Tops, the Jackson 5, Marvin Gaye and Diana Ross, among others, as well as Emmy Award-winning actor Ed Asner in a one-man show titled “FDR.” Tickets for these shows will first be made available to the playhouse’s subscribers and then to the general public.
Wareham takes special care when choosing the shows that bookend the season. The opener needs to appeal to the multinational tourists who pour into Laguna in the summer, while grabbing the attention of the local supporters. Alternately, she wants the closing act to resound with audiences and allow the playhouse to end the year with a bang.
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The tour raves on
Steiner is confident that “Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story” will attract an enthusiastic turnout to the Laguna Playhouse, as it has done at previous venues.
“The audience stands up in the end every single time — a lot of times they’re dancing,” he remarked. “The crowd’s reaction is like it was a big, giant concert by a really important rock and roll artist. No matter what size the theater is, everybody stands up, everybody is dancing, everybody is shouting and hollering and asking for encores.”
Steiner, whose 14-person cast will perform in Canada ahead of its Orange County engagement, is already looking forward to spending time in Laguna Beach, which he called “one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been to.”
Wareham agreed.
“I want to bring work that we are proud of as a theater to this extraordinary community that we’re in,” she said. “It’s their theater. It belongs to everyone. It’s a very special place, Laguna Beach, and I want to make this town proud of its 95-year-old theater.”
For more information about the Laguna Playhouse, visit https://www.lagunaplayhouse.com.
The Laguna Playhouse announcement incorrectly stated July 7 as the opening date for “Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story.” It has since been updated to July 9.