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Tag: Dr Phillips Center

  • Broadway musical ‘& Juliet’ revamps well-known romance story in Central Florida Jan. 6-11

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    Broadway musical ‘& Juliet’ revamps well-known romance story in Central Florida Jan. 6-11

    The show’s lead and a 2025 Jimmy Award winner, Fabiola Caraballo Quijada, joins WESH 2 with a preview.

    IS TAKING CENTER STAGE WITH A MODERN TWIST. THE BROADWAY MUSICAL AND JULIET BREATHES NEW LIFE INTO THE ROMANCE TRAGEDY ROMEO AND JULIET. JOINING ME NOW IS 2025 JIMMY AWARD WINNER AND THE SHOW’S LEAD, FABIOLA. FABIOLA. CARABALLO. QUIJADA. FABIOLA. GREAT TO SEE YOU. THANKS FOR HAVING ME. AND LET ME JUST SAY, MY FAMILY AND I GOT TO SEE THE SHOW LAST NIGHT AND IT IS JUST A CONCERT AND A PARTY, AND YOU GO ON THIS EMOTIONAL JOURNEY WITH YOUR CHARACTER. SO I DON’T KNOW HOW TO EVEN DESCRIBE THE STORY TO SOMEBODY. WHAT DO YOU SAY? YEAH. SO AND JULIET, YOU KNOW, IT KIND OF TAKES A TWIST ON THE CLASSIC ENDING OF OF ROMEO AND JULIET. YOU KNOW, SHAKESPEARE’S INFAMOUS PLAY. AND SO, YOU KNOW, THIS ENDING, YOU KNOW, WE TAKE THE QUESTION, WHAT IF JULIET HADN’T ENDED IT ALL OVER ROMEO? AND SO, YOU KNOW, SHE REALLY STARTS HER JOURNEY OF, OF SELF-EMPOWERMENT AND SHE GOES AND MAKES MISTAKES AND LEARNS FROM HER FRIENDS, AND SHE ULTIMATELY DECIDES THAT HER JOURNEY IS, YOU KNOW, HER DESTINY IS IN HER OWN HANDS. YEAH. AND YOU, YOU PLAY JULIET? OF COURSE. THE LEAD HERE. IT WAS OPENING NIGHT. WE’RE REALLY THANKFUL THAT YOU GOT UP EARLY AND YOU JOINED US HERE. HOW WAS THE ORLANDO AUDIENCE? WHAT WAS THE ENERGY LIKE? YEAH. WE’RE INCREDIBLE. IT WAS INSANE. I HAD NEVER FELT AN ENERGY IN, LIKE, THE FIRST OF ALL, THE THEATER IS JUST INCREDIBLE. IT’S BEAUTIFUL AUDITORIUM. AND YOU GUYS JUST FILLED IT WITH SO MUCH SOUND AND JOY. IT WAS REALLY INCREDIBLE TO FEEL ON STAGE. WELL, AND THEN WE’LL GET TO THIS QUESTION LATER. BUT, YOU KNOW, WE’VE GOT A BIG ORLANDO TIE IN I’M TALKING ABOUT. YEAH, YEAH, MAYBE A BOY BAND MEMBER, YOU KNOW, WHO LIVES HERE IN CENTRAL FLORIDA. BUT FIRST, JULIET, I MEAN, THIS IS A CHARACTER THAT WE KNOW FROM SHAKESPEARE’S WRITING. IT’S A BIG ROLE TO FILL THESE SHOES. HOW DO YOU DO IT NIGHT AFTER NIGHT? YEAH. SO, I MEAN, WE’VE GOT TO START WITH, YOU KNOW, LIKE THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF JULIET, YOU KNOW, LIKE, SHE’S YOUNG AND SHE’S A LITTLE BIT SHELTERED. SHE JUST WANTS TO DO, YOU KNOW, SHE’S KIND OF REBELLIOUS. AND SO WE USE MOST OF THAT IN THIS NEW ADAPTATION. BUT WE ALSO, YOU KNOW, SHE IS JUST WILD AND YOUNG. AND WE TAKE THAT ON. AND, YOU KNOW, WE ALSO INCLUDE LIKE THE POP ELEMENT OF IT. AND SO, YOU KNOW, WE WE KIND OF JUST MIX THE, THE Y2K ELEMENTS WITHIN THE ENTIRE SHOW. AND JULIET IS JUST, OH, SHE’S JUST A ONE BIG BALL OF ENERGY. AND THEN IT BRINGS HER THROUGH SO MUCH IN HER JOURNEY, AND IT LEADS HER TO MEET SO MANY NEW PEOPLE. AND SHE GOES THROUGH A LOT EMOTIONALLY, YOU KNOW, SHE SHE IT’S AN EMOTIONAL ROLLER COASTER FOR JULIET. AND SHE ENDS UP SHE WITH THE VICTORY IN THE END. YES. AND FABIOLA, YOU DO A FANTASTIC JOB WITH THIS SHOW. YOU MENTIONED THE MUSIC. IT IS WHAT THEY CALL A JUKEBOX MUSICAL. SO THESE ARE SONGS ALL OF US SHOULD KNOW? YES. INCLUDING CAST MEMBER HERE THAT WE KNOW FROM A BOY BAND, NSYNC MEMBER JOEY FATONE IS ON STAGE WITH YOU HERE FOR THE ORLANDO SHOWS. YES, JOEY IS PLAYING OUR LANCE THIS WEEK AND THIS WEEK ONLY. HE IS JUST AN INCREDIBLE PERSON TO WORK WITH. HE’S SO, SO FUNNY, SO FULL OF ENERGY. HE REALLY BRINGS AN INCREDIBLE ENERGY TO THE STAGE AND IT’S SO MUCH FUN. IT’S DIFFERENT, BUT YOU KNOW, THAT’S WHAT KEEPS US ON OUR TOES ON STAGE. THE AUDIENCE LOVED SEEING HIM. HE HAS JUST SUCH A FUN PART, BUT IT DOES HAVE THIS EMOTIONAL ARC. I JUST THOUGHT HE WAS GOING TO BE COMEDIC RELIEF LIKE WE FIND IN A SHAKESPEARE PRODUCTION. BUT THERE’S SO MUCH MORE TO TO WHAT JOEY BROUGHT. AND HE DOES LIVE HERE, YOU KNOW, HIS FAMILY’S ROOTED HERE AND WE LOVE SEEING HIM ON STAGE. HE ALSO JUST CAME OFF THE BROADWAY RUN. HE DID TWO STINTS ON BROADWAY OVER THE SUMMER, AND THEN EARLIER IN THE YEAR AT 2025, BIG YEAR FOR JOEY FATONE. BUT FOR YOU TOO, YOU JUST GRADUATED HIGH SCHOOL. I SURE DID. I SAID HIGH SCHOOL THIS PAST SPRING. I MEAN, WHAT A HUGE ACCOMPLISHMENT. NOW IN A BROADWAY TOUR. WOW. THANK YOU. HOW DID THAT HOW DID THAT HAPPEN? YEAH, WELL, I GRADUATED IN MAY OF 2025, AND SHORTLY AFTER I WENT TO NEW YORK FOR THE JIMMY AWARDS, THE NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL THEATER AWARDS. FOR THOSE WHO DON’T KNOW. AND IT WAS A ONE WEEK, INCREDIBLE WEEK IN NEW YORK. AND I ENDED UP TAKING HOME THE PRIZE TO MY PARENTS AND MY FAMILY. AND, YOU KNOW, SHORTLY AFTER THAT, I WAS I WAS OFFERED THE AUDITION FOR ANNE JULIET, AND I WAS LIKE, HEY, I DIDN’T THINK THAT ANYTHING WOULD COME OUT OF IT. AND, WELL, HERE WE ARE. OH, HERE YOU ARE IN A BIG WAY. FANTASTIC IN THE SHOW. AND JULIET PLAYING JULIET. WE JUST WISH YOU CONTINUED SUCCESS. THANK YOU. IT WAS. IT WAS SUCH A FUN RIDE, EVERYBODY. WE WERE ON OUR FEET. IT WAS LIKE A PARTY AT THE END, CELEBRATING WITH. WITH JULIET HERE AND FABIOLA AS WE WRAP THIS UP HERE, WHAT’S THE MESSAGE FOR OTHER YOUNG PEOPLE, BROADWAY KIDS OR BROADWAY ASPIRING YOUNG PEOPLE? WELL, THE THING THAT I ALWAYS SAY IS JUST THAT IT’S SO IMPORTANT TO BELIEVE IN YOURSELF. YOU KNOW, THERE ARE SO MUCH THAT YOU KNOW THAT YOU CAN ACCOMPLISH. YOU JUST NEED TO HAVE A VISION OF WHERE YOU WANT TO BE, AND YOU NEED TO TRY EVERYTHING YOU DO, EVERYTHING THAT IS IN YOUR POWER TO TO TRULY TAKE THIS STEP FORWARD. OPEN DOORS. DON’T BE AFRAID TO STEP OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE BECAUSE YOU KNOW A LOT CAN HAPPEN. THERE’S A LOT OF THINGS THAT YOU YOU, YOU DON’T KNOW THAT YOU CAN DO UNTIL YOU KNOW, YOU TAKE THAT STEP AND THERE YOU ARE. WE LOVE IT. GREAT WORDS. FABIOLA. THANK YOU. A REALLY FUN SHOW. AND WE’RE TALKING ABOUT, YOU KNOW, HITS THAT MAX MARTIN WROTE THAT. YES. HALF OF THEM CAME OUT BEFORE YOU WERE EVEN BORN HERE. OH, BUT I KNOW HIM JUST AS WELL. OH, LET ME TELL YOU. BETTER THAN I THAN I OR ANYBODY IN THE AUDIENCE SAYS YOU’VE GOT IT. AND WE’RE GOING TO POST A LINK TO ALL THE SHOW INFORMATION. FABIOLA, WE’RE LOVING YOU AS JULIET. CAN’T WAIT TO SEE THE SKY’S THE LIMIT FOR YOUR CAREER. THANK YOU SO MUCH. ALL THE INFORMATION IS U

    Broadway musical ‘& Juliet’ revamps well-known romance story in Central Florida Jan. 6-11

    The show’s lead and a 2025 Jimmy Award winner, Fabiola Caraballo Quijada, joins WESH 2 with a preview.

    Updated: 10:02 AM EST Jan 7, 2026

    Editorial Standards

    The Broadway musical “& Juliet” puts a modern spin on the well-known Shakespearean romance story, “Romeo and Juliet,” as the national tour makes a stop in Central Florida. The show’s lead and a 2025 Jimmy Award winner, Fabiola Caraballo Quijada, joins WESH 2 with a preview.The show will take center stage at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts from Jan. 6-11, 2026. Orlando native and *NSYNC superstar Joey Fatone joins the Orlando stops of the North American Tour of the hit musical as “Lance.”Click here to learn more.

    The Broadway musical “& Juliet” puts a modern spin on the well-known Shakespearean romance story, “Romeo and Juliet,” as the national tour makes a stop in Central Florida.

    The show’s lead and a 2025 Jimmy Award winner, Fabiola Caraballo Quijada, joins WESH 2 with a preview.

    The show will take center stage at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts from Jan. 6-11, 2026.

    Orlando native and *NSYNC superstar Joey Fatone joins the Orlando stops of the North American Tour of the hit musical as “Lance.”

    Click here to learn more.

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  • Fringe mainstay Chase Padgett festively shreds with the return of ‘6 String Christmas’

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    Credit: Courttesy

    So this week we’ve got an early morning of guitar mayhem and a more soothing holiday tradition of guitar festiveness courtesy of Chase Padgett. It’s like the two faces of Fahey manifest!

    Orlando Fringe mainstay Padgett (6 Guitars, Nashville Hurricane), brings his popular Christmas revue this weekend to the intimate Pugh Theater at the Dr. Phillips Center. Expect Padgett to give popular Christmas tunes the full ax treatment — we mean guitar — and tell some stories and jokes along the way.

    Both shows are early enough that you can pop out to the free Frontyard Holiday Festival afterward to keep the vibes peak festive.

    2 & 7 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 21, Alexis and Jim Pugh Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave, drphillipscenter.org, $47.20-$53.10.



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    Matthew Moyer
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  • ‘National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation’ screens in Orlando with star Chevy Chase in the house

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    Let’s hear what he has to say Credit: screengrab/National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation

    Mark the 35th anniversary of holiday cinema classic National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation with a screening at the Dr. Phillips Center, featuring special guest Chevy “Clark Griswold“ Chase.

    After the show, Chase will speak about the 1989 film and take questions from the audience alongside his wife, Jayni. The film has held up remarkably well over the years, and Chase’s over-the-top performance as the frazzled Griswold patriarch cracking up under the pressure of making the trip perfect is much of the reason why.

    But will the famously prickly Chase be naughty or nice in person? Much like opening a Christmas gift from a loose-cannon relative, half the fun is the nervous uncertainty.

    7:30 p.m., Friday, Nov. 21, Walt Disney Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave., drphillipscenter.org, $53-$295.


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    Music, vendors, food trucks, a children’s holiday village and a fireworks display

    The game is only half the fun

    Holiday tradition returns for a 13th year



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    Emmy Bailey
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  • Holiday tradition ‘Clare and the Chocolate Nutcracker’ returns to the Dr. Phillips Center this weekend

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    Credit: Courtesy

    The annual holiday tradition of Clare and the Chocolate Nutcracker, presented by Orlando Community Arts, takes the Dr. Phil’s stage for a 13th year.

    More than 100 dancers and actors make this fresh twist on the traditional Nutcracker ballet a reality. Clare’s reveries take the audience through a magical journey around the world, visiting Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Haiti, India, Puerto Rico and more on her way to the Kingdom of Toys.

    Under the creative leadership of Beverly Page, the production stars Sairi Witherspoon as Clare, Xavier Logan as the Chocolate Nutcracker Prince, Charisma Tran as the Sugar Plum Fairy, and Sa’Naa Natalia Brahimi as the Snow Queen. Expect guest appearances from violinist Jaquay Pearce and the Mime Boyz.

    7 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 22, Walt Disney Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave., drphillipscenter.org, $58-$104.


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    In Florida, maliciously disturbing a religious gathering is a first-degree misdemeanor, or a third-degree felony with hate crime enhancement



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    Emmy Bailey
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  • Comedian Ali Siddiq headlines the Dr. Phillips Center this week

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    Credit: Courtesy

    Ali Siddiq is “In the Shadows” and on the way to Orlando.

    Siddiq is a Houston-based comedian with a unique style of storytelling he honed while incarcerated. With his mix of razor-sharp humor and a fearless voice, he made his name on a four-part series of comedy specials, The Domino Effect 1-4, with over 40 million views on YouTube. In 2013, Siddiq had his breakthrough moment when he won Comedy Central’s Up Next competition.

    Since then, he has been on Comedy Central, HBO and NBC. This show focuses on the twists and turns in Siddiq’s life after the specials, detailing the hustle and determination required to ensure he never returned to prison.

    7 p.m. Friday, Nov. 14, Walt Disney Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave., drphillipscenter.org, $35.50-$150.



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    Emmy Bailey
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  • Broadway in Orlando review: Touring ‘Water for Elephants’ is almost as enchanting as it was in NYC

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    A few years ago, I flew up to New York City to see a certain Broadway blockbuster about a boy wizard (which will be apparating in Orlando next January) and decided to take a chance on a discount matinee ticket for yet another book-turned-movie-turned-play. But while I walked into the musical adaptation of Water for Elephants with sawdust-sized expectations, it proved to be a far more magical experience than the mega-budget muggle marathon I’d endure later that evening. Indeed, I exited that original production feeling like I was soaring on a flying trapeze, and the only thing that brought me back to earth was skepticism that any touring company — particularly a non-Equity one like the NETWorks presentation presently at the Dr. Phillips Center — could hope to approach its heights.

    Fortunately, I needn’t have fretted, because this touring production faithfully provides a good 95 percent of what made it so enchanting on Broadway. Rick Elice’s beautifully written book, which adapts Sara Gruen’s novel with impressive efficiency and emotional depth, frames the Depression-era fable as a memory play, narrated by the elderly Mr. Jankowski (Robert Tully, even more authentic than his Broadway counterpart). He recounts his younger days as Jacob (Zachary Keller, charmingly cornfed), the reluctant veterinarian for a ragtag traveling circus ruled by August (Connor Sullivan, cruelly charismatic) and populated by kind-hearted outcasts. 

    An unconventional love quadrangle develops between Jacob; the sadistic ringmaster’s winsome wife, June (Helen Krushinski, a petite powerhouse); and Rosie, the titular pachyderm, as incarnated by a giant puppet with gorgeous eyelashes. She’s only the most massive member of puppet designers Camille LaBarre, Ray Wetmore & JR Goodman’s enchanting menagerie, which also includes Broadway’s most affecting abstracted equine since War Horse. All creatures great and small figure in the climactic tragedy that Jacob’s tale inevitably builds to, but fear not, animal lovers, because [spoiler alert] the elephant gets a happy ending. 

    All the major elements of the Broadway production have been retained for the tour, including Takeshi Kata’s sets, David I. Reynoso’s costumes and Bradley King’s lighting, all of which successfully evoke Dust Bowl barrenness and big-top ballyhoo. Most importantly, the show’s chorus of “kinkers & rousts” is up to the challenge of not only dancing Jesse Robb & Shana Carroll’s athletic choreography while singing homespun harmonies behind PigPen Theatre Co.’s cozy folk-inflected songs, but also executing death-defying feats of aerial acrobatics. Unlike the over-praised production of Pippin that circus designer Carroll’s company The 7 Fingers previously worked on, the spellbinding cirque stunts in Water for Elephants feel organically integrated and utterly essential.

    Those who did see the Broadway cast will notice that tour director Ryan Emmons’ re-creation of Jessica Stone’s original work is missing some pacing subtleties and emotional nuance. The cast, while impressively energetic overall, are mostly on their first national tours, and many struggle with diction and breath control during kinetic production numbers like “The Road Don’t Make You Young” and “Zostan” — an issue exacerbated by opening night’s inconsistent microphone mix, which has become an ongoing and consistent problem for the Broadway in Orlando series. Those relatively minor issues didn’t prevent my cheeks from getting just as moist during Water for Elephant’s elegiac coda as they were when I first watched it on the Great White Way. Jump through whatever hoops you have to to catch this soul-soothing circus before it runs away without you.

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  • Lucy Darling brings an evening of (magic) tricks and treats to Orlando on Halloween

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    Lucy Darling Credit: James Murphy/Trainman Photography

    Lucy Darling brings a spooky twist on her acclaimed touring variety show to the Dr. Phillips Center, combining cabaret and masterful magic for a night of tricks and treats.

    Darling gained national attention with her appearances on Penn & Teller: Fool Us and is featured in the Guinness Book of World Records for her fire-eating stunt. This eerie offshoot of Darling’s “You’re Welcome” tour blends stand-up, glamour and sleight of hand with a theatrical, vintage variety-show flair.

    She’ll be joined by musician, composer and globe-trotting juggler Mark Ettinger, who accompanies her on piano, ukulele and an “orchestra of oddities.”

    8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 31, Steinmetz Hall, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave., drphillipscenter.org, $70-$117.


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  • Celebrate ‘Rocky Horror’ at 50 at the Dr. Phillips Center with some very special guests – Orlando Weekly

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    Celebrate ‘Rocky’ at 50 at the Dr. Phil

    Oh Rocky, has the Dr. Phil got a shadowcast for you.

    To mark a half-century of the seminal, genderfluid, glammy midnight monster musical, Rocky Horror Picture Show screens at our most lavish downtown venue.

    Probably no rice-throwing during this one — though there will be a prop bag handed to each attendee — but to make up for it, special guests from the 1975 film version will be in the castle: Barry “Brad” Bostwick, along with accidental gothic style icons Nell “Columbia” Campbell and Patricia “Magenta” Quinn.

    7:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 12, Walt Disney Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, 445 S. Magnolia Ave., drphillipscenter.org, $46-$300.



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  • Kyona Levine Farmer is always looking for a ‘message of redemption’ – Orlando Weekly

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    The cast of ‘Next to Normal’ Credit: courtesy SparKyL Entertainment

    During this first weekend of October, downtown’s Dr. Phillips Center will echo with the anguished cries of a mourning mother driven into a sanitarium by specters of sorrow. But these haunted house horrors aren’t Gothic fantasies from an earlier era; rather, they’re relatable modern-day struggles faced by the fractured Goodman family in Next to Normal, the Tony-winning 2008 rock musical by Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey. Kyona Levine Farmer, a local director and founder of SparKyL Entertainment, recently spoke with me about her latest production upon one of Orlando’s most prestigious stages, and the coast-to-coast journey that brought her there.

    A native of Orlando, Levine Farmer attended Dr. Phillips High School (where she was “super shy”) and majored in English at the University of Florida, before making her way to New York City. “I wanted to write to perform,” says Levine Farmer. “During my day, they didn’t have a lot of stories that I thought were a reflection of the things that I wanted to see, so I pursued writing because I was good at it.” Entering a graduate program at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts straight out of undergrad “was an amazing experience for me. Of course, New York will take the shyness out of you.”

    After grad school, a 10-year stint in Los Angeles pursuing an acting career led to her brief return to New York in a friend’s off-Broadway play. “I was amazed by the experience of doing his original work there. And when I got back to L.A., I was like, ‘I can do that,’” recalls Levine Farmer, who then produced a script she’d written in grad school using money saved from her day job. “It was the first time that I produced and directed, and I don’t think that I went back to acting after that. I just love the storytelling element of directing.” 

    Due to a “spiritual feeling that I’m probably not supposed to be [in L.A.] forever”, Levine Farmer returned home to Orlando in 2010, when she presented her play Sweet Evalina at Orlando Shakes and started SparKyL Entertainment, before taking a job teaching theater at a local private school. After meeting her husband, Vince Farmer, the couple began producing shows together, despite his background being more in mathematics and basketball than the arts. “He would always attend the rehearsals when I was teaching,” says Kyona of Vince, “and he’s just really mesmerized by the process of building from start to finish.”

    Following a few fallow years, SparKyL sparked back to life in 2024 with The Color Purple: The Musical, performing in the same Alexis & Jim Pugh Theater where Next to Normal will be this weekend. Affording such a vaunted venue isn’t easy as an independent producer — even after the discounted rental rate offered to 501(c)(3) educational organizations and free rehearsal space at a Maitland church — but Levine Farmer says their focus goes beyond profits. “We don’t have any children, so the things that we would do with having children, we invest in doing things that we love,” she explains. “We just really try to give our best to establish the kind of show that we want to be known for.”

    On the opposite end of the budgetary scale, SparKyL caught my eye at last May’s Orlando Fringe Festival with Bobby Lee Blood, a family drama that Levine Farmer originally created as a one-woman show. Levine Farmer calls her first Fringe experience “extremely, extremely fulfilling,” adding, “I just didn’t know that it would be so much fun to see so much new work, just to be in that atmosphere of artistry.”

    Intriguingly, Bobby Lee Blood featured two different casts: one white-presenting and one African American. “I love new perspectives on stories, [and] there are particular stories that are specific to African Americans, or a certain type of culture or race,” says Levine Farmer. “There are some stories that are universal, [and] I find it fascinating to go into the human perspective of stories that don’t have a specific cultural context.” 

    Similarly, while Next to Normal features a predominately white-presenting cast (with understudies of color) led by Angela Tims and Mathew Nash-Brown as Diana and Dan Goodman, Levine Farmer cites a personal connection to the material that goes deeper than culture. “I am drawn to just a good story,” says Levine Farmer. “Then once my mother and my mother-in-law were diagnosed with dementia, the topic of the show was extremely interesting to us. And when I opened up the casting, I knew that I didn’t want to stick to a specific cultural cast, so I just opened it up to anyone.” 

    The common thread connecting all these culturally diverse works is the “message of redemption” that Levine Farmer says she always looks for in a project. “We want hope, and we want stories that will require a conversation,” Levine Farmer says of her script selection process. “I know I need to do something fun and light, something stupidly funny, because we have been doing tons of shows that are dramas that cause a lot of thought. But they feel most fulfilling to me, the shows that really give people something when they leave.”

    (Next to Normal, Oct. 3-5 at the Alexis & Jim Pugh Theater, Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, $65-$89.)


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  • ‘Daily Show’ alumni Roy Wood Jr. and Jordan Klepper are coming to Orlando in December

    ‘Daily Show’ alumni Roy Wood Jr. and Jordan Klepper are coming to Orlando in December

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    Courtesy photo

    Jordan Klepper and Roy Wood Jr. come to Orlando for some serious comedy

    Daily Show stars and comedic firebrands Jordan Klepper and Roy Wood Jr. are teaming up to say hello/goodbye to “America, for the Last Time” in December.

    Billed cheekily as “a comedic town hall that digs into the issues that matter and many that do not,” Wood and Klepper are taking their show on the road to just two cities [so far announced] in this newest leg of their duo tour: Brooklyn in November and Orlando in December. A Q&A portion of the evening is tantalizingly hinted at.

    Both are longtime Daily Show correspondents who have branched out into a multiplicity of solo endeavors — stand-up tours, documentaries and solo specials. And both embody deadpan [Klepper] and exasperated [Wood Jr.] humor like few others.

    “America, for the Last Time” comes to the Walt Disney Theater at the Dr. Phillips Center on Dec. 7. Tickets are on sale through the venue.


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  • TikTok personality Nurse John brings his ‘Short-Staffed Tour’ to Orlando this fall

    TikTok personality Nurse John brings his ‘Short-Staffed Tour’ to Orlando this fall

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    Image via @nurse.johnn/Instagram

    Paging Nurse John, you’re due to begin your shift in Orlando

    Social media personality John Dela Cruz, best known for making relatable and humorous nurse content on various platforms, is heading out on his first-ever tour — and it’s coming to Orlando.

    The “Short-Staffed Tour,” will see Cruz use the best coping mechanism available for someone working a job in healthcare: comedy.

    Widely known as Nurse John, Cruz is a licensed nurse and uses his platform to make playful videos touching on the challenges he faces as a nurse. Often using a dramatic eye-bag filter on TikTok (and usually holding an energy drink), Cruz quickly grew a sizeable online fanbase.

    Along with relatable videos, Cruz hosts a podcast that has amassed more than 3 million downloads called “I Beg Your Pardon.” Using this podcast as a form of therapy, he pokes fun at and complains about the ever-growing list of struggles that comes with working in the healthcare field.

    With his first-ever tour, Cruz brings the daily aggravations of being a nurse to the stage. The show will include new material written exclusively for the tour, and those with VIP tickets will get the chance to meet Cruz and spill the workplace tea backstage — just make sure you don’t violate HIPPA.

    Join Nurse John in using laughter as a coping mechanism on Nov. 2 at 7 p.m. at the Dr. Phillips Center’s Steinmetz Hall. Tickets start at $35 and can be purchased through the venue’s website.

    @nurse.johnn LIKE CAN I TAKE A SIP OF MY DAMN COFFEE FIRST??!!??!! #nurse #nurses #nurselife #nursehumor #nurseproblem #nursing #nursingschool #nursingstudent #nursejohnn ♬ original sound – nurse.johnn


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  • Casey Abrams is coming to the Dr. Phillips Center for a multi-night run of shows

    Casey Abrams is coming to the Dr. Phillips Center for a multi-night run of shows

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  • Steve-O promises ‘flagrantly unacceptable’ night at Orlando tour stop Sunday

    Steve-O promises ‘flagrantly unacceptable’ night at Orlando tour stop Sunday

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    Photo courtesy Ticketmaster

    Podcaster and ‘Jackass’ star Steve-O perforns at the Dr. Phil

    Steve-O said he’s transitioned from “celebration mode” to “acceptance mode” since celebrating his 50th birthday earlier this month.

    Of course, for him, accepting age looks like performing back-to-back stunt shows in Orlando this weekend and then getting launched out of a pontoon boat at Mike Busey’s Sausage Castle the following day.

    The stunt-performing star of the Jackass MTV show and films will bring his newest tour, tentatively titled “Steve-O’s Gone Too Far,” to the Dr. Phillips Center’s Alexis & Jim Pugh Theater for two shows at 5 and 8 p.m. on Sunday, June 30.

    The multimedia event will combine live stunts with video footage from old, unaired Jackass sequences cut from the original films because they were deemed unairable, Steve-O says.

    “The powers that be would want to have completely scrubbed them from existence. But unfortunately, I have all the video,” he says. “I was nervous about it because I genuinely felt that maybe the stuff I’m presenting is just too horrific.”

    But Steve-O has been delighted by audiences’ enthusiastic reactions at the shows he’s performed so far, he says. He considers live reactions the “only way” to get honest feedback — as opposed to comments on his podcast or YouTube channel, which can be disingenuous.

    “A whole room can’t pretend to laugh out loud … people can’t fake their response in a live situation, so it’s really the only way to find out which jokes work,” he says. “That’s what this run is all about.”

    Over the past 13 years, Steve-O’s live performances have come a long way from a simple stage and microphone. This tour will be his second to include multimedia elements after he introduced the format during his 2023 tour, “Steve-O’s Bucket List.” But after wrapping Steve-O’s Gone Too Far, he may retire from live physical stunts, he said.

    “I don’t care to have to keep pushing the boundaries of all the physical stuff that I do anymore,” he says. “But to get better and better at something and then just stop entirely might not make sense, so I just don’t know what the future looks like.”

    Steve-O recounted a conversation with media personality Caitlyn Jenner where she compared him to Elton John. The beloved British songwriter used to perform in increasingly elaborate, outrageous outfits on tour, until at a certain point he couldn’t keep topping himself, relates Steve-O.

    At a certain point, John gave up and started wearing normal suits. Steve-O compares this tour to his “Elton John moment,” while his next tour may feature him donning a metaphorical suit, dropping physical stunts in favor of a simple microphone.

    Performing for Florida is a homecoming of sorts for Steve-O, who lived in the state off and on throughout his childhood and graduated from Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College in Sarasota in 1997.

    Steve-O still has family in Florida, including his father, who will attend his performance in West Palm Beach a couple of days before the Orlando stop. Although nervous for his father to attend the show, Steve-O says he has no plans to tone it down for his sake.

    “I’ve always said about my live comedy, ‘Dad, don’t judge the show based on what you think of me,’” he says. “‘Judge the show based on how the audience responds to it.’”

    The Jackass MTV series was filmed partially in Orlando, including a stunt from the first episode of Season 3 when Steve-O walks down Rosalind Avenue in an Uncle Sam costume and stilts and exaggeratedly falls over to gauge reactions from passersby.

    Steve-O hopes his return to Orlando will leave Dr. Phillips Center audiences horrified by exploits ranging from “feats of anal penetration” to gun-shooting stunts, he says.

    “I’m an entertainer, which I believe is synonymous with ‘attention whore,’” he says. “I want everyone to pay attention to me, and I want them to be glad that they did, because they had a good time at my show.”


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    Zoey Thomas

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  • Theater review: ‘Jagged Little Pill’ flips the playbook on jukebox musicals with a strong book and expressive choreography

    Theater review: ‘Jagged Little Pill’ flips the playbook on jukebox musicals with a strong book and expressive choreography

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    photo by Matthew Murphy, Evan Zimmerman

    Cast of the North American touring production of “Jagged Little Pill”

    Since the blockbuster success of Mamma Mia, theater fans have grown accustomed to jukebox musicals all following the same familiar formula: Start with a playlist of nostalgic pop tunes, tie them together with a superficial storyline, and polish into a blandly inoffensive crowd-pleaser.

    However, my jaded attitude toward the genre was given a serious shaking by Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill: The Musical, which is currently playing at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts as part of the Broadway in Orlando touring series. This show surprisingly flips the usual playbook on its head and dives into difficult subject matter, emerging with a divisive production that’s messy and frustratingly flawed, yet also aesthetically and emotionally arresting. 

    Event Details

    “Jagged Little Pill”

    Thu., March 21, 8 p.m., Fri., March 22, 8 p.m., Sat., March 23, 2 & 8 p.m. and Sun., March 24, 1 & 6:30 p.m.

    Jagged Little Pill’s strengths start with the Tony-winning book, written by Diablo Cody of Juno fame. Set in upper-class Connecticut suburbs on the eve of the pandemic, it follows the fumbling efforts of Gen X supermom Mary Jane Healy (Julie Reiber) to connect with her Gen Z adopted Black daughter, Frankie (Teralin Jones), while simultaneously hiding her spiraling opioid addiction from her workaholic husband Steve (Benjamin Eakeley) and the rest of her family and friends.

    When the rich friend of their Harvard-bound son Nick (Dillon Klena) is accused of raping Frankie’s friend Bella (Allison Sheppard; Delaney Brown on opening night), the Healys’ outwardly “perfect” life is shattered. Told with a wit and complexity that’s rarely seen in similar shows, this is a trigger warning-worthy tale of terrifying relevance that evokes #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, tackling enough dramatic material to fuel a stand-alone straight play or two.

    Thankfully, this dark story dovetails well with the heartache and angst encapsulated by Alanis Morissette’s late-’90s albums. All of her big hits are here, from “All I Really Want” to “Ironic” (which gets a hilarious mid-song grammatical mansplaining), and orchestrator Tom Kitt has given them a theatrical lushness without sacrificing their grungy alt-rock origins, much as he did for Green Day’s American Idiot. Crucially, the key cast members are capable of matching Morissette’s mezzo-soprano singing range, while also echoing her aching intensity. In that regard, the most striking member of the talented Equity ensemble is Jade McLeod (as Frankie’s jilted first love Jo), who powerfully delivers “You Oughta Know” with a raw primal rage that rattles the rafters.

    Director Diane Paulus keeps the action flowing cinematically across Riccardo Hernandez’s minimalist set, which frames the elevated onstage orchestra with a proscenium of sliding video screens and color-changing LED strips. The MVP of Jagged Little Pill may just be choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, whose expressive gesture-based movement direction seamlessly blends hip-hop and modern dance with ingenious acrobatics. The intricate backward blocking for “Smiling” and the chilling couch combat during “Uninvited” were among the most exciting musical theater moments I’ve seen in years.

    With so much going in its favor, it pains me to admit that a good portion of the audience will feel alienated by Jagged Little Pill, with justification. First and foremost, the audio mixing is inexcusably awful, hearkening back to the worst days of the Bob Carr. Ensemble singers sound breathy and hollow, lead vocals are alternatively edgy and muffled, and the eight-piece band led by Matt Doebler consistently overpowers the cast. If you want to understand more than 20 percent of the lyrics, download the GalaPro captioning app and pray you can connect to the venue’s WiFi.

    If you can get past the unintelligible audio, you may also notice that although this show would easily ace the Bechdel test (for a refreshing change), all of the male characters are exceptionally underdeveloped in comparison to their multi-dimensional female counterparts. Frankie’s new beau Phoenix (Rishi Golani) in particular is little more than a plot device, and neither of the Healy men are especially interesting, so their scenes severely slow down the show.

    Ultimately, I enjoyed Jagged Little Pill far more than I expected to, which is what makes its problems all the more exasperating. Although I can’t wholeheartedly endorse it for anyone who doesn’t have Morissette’s lyrics engraved in their memory banks, it commanded my interest from start to finish, and didn’t assault me during the bows with an overblown megamix — which is much more than I can say about Moulin Rouge.

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    Seth Kubersky

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