Anyone who knows me knows I love Singin in the Rain. The movie is of course a classic but they also did a great job with the Broadway adaptation. Indeed, I like it so much I have seen it 9 times since the pandemic. It’s funny and romantic with great songs and choreography. What’s not to like?. The latest production is at Hopebox Theatre and it is as lovely as their theater’s mission.

Hopebox has a special goal to help support individuals fighting with cancer. Each show picks a Hopebox recipient and ticket sales and other fundraising goes to help that recipient with medical expenses. I love this program and find it gives Hopebox shows an added layer of heart and soul as they try and help a member of their community (it can make them hard to review but it’s worth it!)

For Singin’ in the Rain they have 2 casts and I saw the Silver cast with the other cast being Teal. This is a show that lives and dies on its leads, and I really enjoyed all 4 leads in the cast I saw. Braden Hull and Jordyn Tracy have nice chemistry together as Don Lockwood and Cathy Selden respectively. Garrett Stephenson is expressive as Cosmo and Caitlin Olsen is a hoot as Lina Lamont (she gets the Lina voice down perfectly.)

One challenge Hopebox has is the stage is small so director Leslie Richards and choreographer Ginny Waldron have to make every inch of floor available count. Richards helps make this feel seamless with her brilliant set design that allows for panels to fold in and out to create screens for movie watching as well as other settings. They also did a very good job with the silent movie footage for the “Dancing Cavalier” and other filmed scenes.

Some of my favorite moments of the show are between Hull and Tracy including their meet cute on Hollywood Blvd, “You are my Lucky Star” on the backlot and in act 2 for “Would You.” Like I said, they had terrific chemistry which made those scenes really pop. Stephenson sells the physical comedy of “Make Em Laugh” and Olsen is very funny with “What’s Wrong with Me” (usually new songs written for stage adaptations are terrible but I like this one. It feels at home with the rest of the songs and nice to give Lina a solo.)

The only major downside to the production is the iconic ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ number was a little light on the rain. I’m not sure if something wasn’t working because the ceiling had lots of pipes for the water but very little actually coming out. It just loses some of the magic of the scene if we can barely see the rain. If there is any way they could fix that it would make the scene better. There are also time when the backtrack overwhelms the singers both in volume and timing, but I’m sure that just takes practice.

They are doing some renovations to their parking lot at Hopebox so make sure to arrive early when you attend Singin in the Rain. It’s a long show but one the whole family should be able to enjoy. I enjoyed it enough I hope I can come back and see the other cast. It is playing through March 14th and tickets can be purchased here.

Singin in the Rain is a musical based on the 1952 film of the same name which was actually a jukebox musical of popular tunes of its day. The stage version has music by Nacio Herb Brown and lyrics by Arthur Freed and a book by Adolph Green and Betty Comden. It first premiered on Broadway in 1985.

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