Mountain Theatre Company has officially begun performances of their third show of the 2022 season and their second ever Fall show with the opening night of “BKLYN: A Sidewalk Fairytale” on Friday, Sept. 23.
“BKLYN,” which was originally written in 2004 by Mark Schoenfeld and Barri McPherson, has a run time of 90 to 100 minutes and uses the story within a story structure as a group of street performers under the Brooklyn Bridge tells the story of a young girl from Paris, named Brooklyn, who uses her musical gifts to find the father she never knew.
“It’s a beautiful tale about family and faith, and the family we’re born into and the family that we create,” Mountain Theatre Company Executive Artistic Director Scott Daniel said. “It’s told through a classic theatrical device, like a fairy tale. It’s very much storybook. The narrator guides us through this show, we learn who the antagonist and the protagonist are and as we reach a climax of the show, it all comes to a very happy ending.”
The show features a five-person cast, including Craig Smith as Taylor, Camille Capers as Paradice, Mackenzie Germain as Brooklyn, Jason Scott McLaughlin as Streetsinger and Alyson Snyder as Faith.
“I believe [the audience] can take away a conversation,” Daniel said. “There are a lot of themes in the show that create a conversation and that is what the story does for us. We are not telling you how to feel, we are presenting a piece of content to you for you to emote from and I think everyone will see the show differently from different angles and different point of views and then that will create a dinner conversation, which is kind of what art should be about, to create a conversation.”
The show is directed and choreographed by Daniel and while this is “BKLYN’s” premiere debut in North Carolina, Daniel himself has a fairly long history with the show, having ushered for a New York production of the show in the early 2000’s, before going on to direct for the first time around ten years ago.
“It speaks to what our season is all about, and all of our shows [this season] are about people who have a gift, and how they use that gift to inspire and motivate other people in times of strife or times of turmoil, either in their personal lives or kind of all over the world,” Daniel said.
The show has become the MTC’s most successful Fall show, already selling 170 tickets. It is also currently on track to reach a similar level of success as the company’s previous shows, “Jersey Boys” and “Sentimental Journey”, which sold 2,905 tickets and has become the second highest attended and grossing production in the MTC’s 84-year history.
“BKLYN” will run at the Highlands Playhouse until Oct. 16, when the company will take a break from their regularly scheduled season to prepare for their final show of the season, Home for the Holidays, which will run from Dec. 16 until Dec. 31. The company will also be launching their new “Theatre for Young Audiences” initiative with the opening of their show “A Wrinkle in Time” on Nov. 4 to Nov. 13.
“We are so excited about our next adventure, and this incredible cast will be with us for another three weeks of performances,” Daniel said. “Then we will turn around the next day and start our incredible new initiative, TYA by MTC productions.”