Broadway Bound and ACT Present Seattle’s
First Professional Staging of Jason Robert Brown’s musical, 13.
In December of 2011 Broadway Bound Children’s Theatre, in association with ACT, presented Seattle’s first professional staging of Tony award winner Jason Robert Brown’s coming-of-age musical 13. This collaborative venture between the two companies resulted in ten performances at ACT’s Falls Theatre, and marked Broadway’s Bound first venture into Seattle’s professional theatre scene.
13, A New Musical is a grown-up story about growing up. Evan Goldman has it all — he’s popular, has the perfect family and lives in the greatest city in the world — New York. That is until his parents get divorced and he’s forced to move with his Mom… to Indiana. Uprooted from his old life, he has to make new friends and somehow maneuver his way through the minefield of junior high school to become part of the ―in-crowd‖ in time for the celebration of his Bar Mitzvah. With an unforgettable rock score from composer Jason Robert Brown, 13 is a hilarious, high-energy musical for all ages about discovering that cool is where you find it, and sometimes where you least expect it.
13 earned the L.A. Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Production and Best Musical Score for its world premiere production at Center Theatre Group/The Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles in 2007. The musical subsequently opened in 2008 featuring the only all-teenage cast to ever be on Broadway and closed in January 2009 after 105 performances and 22 previews. Following this lead, Broadway Bound will also present an all-teen cast.
Jason Robert Brown is one of Broadway’s newest and most in demand composers, receiving the Tony Award for Best Original Musical Score for Parade, directed by Harold Prince. His other major works include Songs for a New World and The Last Five Years. He is currently working on several projects, including a musical version of the hit movie Honeymoon in Vegas, a musical adaption to The Bridges of Madison County with Marsha Norman and screenplays for movies of 13 and The Last Five Years. In addition, it was recently announced that he will direct a 2012 London production of 13, featuring members of England’s National Youth Music Theatre.
Dan Elish is a songwriter and children’s writer known for the novel Born Too Short: Confessions of an 8th Grade Basket Case. Robert Horn is a veteran writer for TV and film (Designing Women, Living Single).
The professional team behind the Broadway Bound and ACT production of 13 included Jimmy Nixon, Director; Sonia Dawkins, Choreographer; Barbara Lynne Jamison, Musical Director; Norm Spencer and Martin Christoffel, Co-Scenic Designers; Deborah Hartwell, Costume Designer; Tom Sturge, Lighting Designer; Tony Hoffman, Sound Designer; and James D’Asaro, Stage Manager.
Prior to this partnership with ACT, Broadway Bound has created several collaborative teen productions with organizations throughout Seattle: A Broadway Symphonic Spectacular featured nine singers aged 15-21 in a concert of Broadway selections, accompanied by a 100-piece Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra at the Moore Theatre. Broadway Bound’s extensive outreach program produced the Seattle premiere of the new musical God Lives in Glass, performed by a teen cast at the Paul Robeson Performing Arts Center in Rainier Beach and generously supported by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
13 opened in previews on Thursday, December 8th and ran through Sunday, December 18.
