A Bronx Tale: The musical

Musicals get everyone tapping their feet, even the Non-theatre goer can enjoy a musical. A musical that would do just that for an audience is A Bronx Tale: The Musical. This musical is the best of both worlds, a fun theatre experience, catchy music, and powerful messages about family, love, breaking social norms, and making your own choices. This musical was adapted from Robert Deniro and Chazz Palminteri’s 1993 Masterpiece A Bronx Tale. It was written by Chazz who wrote this as an autobiography to relive his own life. It follows Calogero, a boy living in the Bronx, New York who soon hangs with the wrong kind of people and it ends up affecting his family and his life forever. The story is such a timeless piece that almost everyone can take at least one message from this piece. The music for this musical was written by the legends themselves Alan Menken and Glenn Slater. Alan Menken a line has composed many soundtracks for movies that many Disney enthusiasts will recognize, like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and many more. Glenn Slater has worked on many musicals like the stage production of The Little Mermaid, The Sister Act, and Love Never Dies just to name a few. Both of these men have worked on multiple projects together so you know the music will be amazing. 

This production of A Bronx Tale would be a great musical to put production at UCI. It has messages for people of all ages, especially for young people. As young students, we are impressionable and this musical has a huge message about the choices we make, and lead the life we love. That message resonates with me as a young impressionable student. There are many things that we think are the right thing to do at the time, that can be from peer pressure or the environment we grow up in but this whole play flips that on its head. It shows us that the choices we make us who we are and if we choose wrong they can change our lives forever. The casting would vary but I’d love to have Don Hill direct this production, he’s worked on many productions at UCI and Off-Broadway productions. With his years of experience, he will bring an amazing product as he has with all of his productions. 

This production would be a very great piece for everyone to experience. It is one of the most powerful musicals I’ve seen and I know it will affect people the same way. This would be the production of choice I am passionate about. 

Las Mujeres del Mar

The play Las Mujeres del Mar has a place close to my heart and ideally, I would have a production of this show in a small theater in Santa Ana. Let’s start with a summary of this play, Las Mujeres del Mar takes place in Los Angeles and Puerto Azula, a small fishing village in Mexico. It follows three generations of women dealing with generational trauma from each of their pasts. Each of their choices in the show affects the next generation. We follow the characters of Virginia the grandmother, Marina The Mother, and Lupe the daughter on this journey of reconciliation for their family. I feel Santa Ana is a great place for this story to come alive as a Mexican American living in Santa Ana. I see the community every day and I’d say it’s one of the most Hispanic-dense communities in the County. The area is full of rich Latino culture that this play touches on throughout. Coming from a family of immigrants this play resonates with me and will with others living in Santa Ana and the surrounding areas. This is also an ideal area because due to the community in this area it would be a great way to bring a Latino story in front of the community which would bring the community closer together and brings more Latino theatergoers.

Seeing as the majority of people I want to see the show are the Latino community I know firsthand the things that come to mind when wanting to see any kind of entertainment. I for one don’t have a lot of money and I know that others don’t either, so in response to that I would love for the show to be as cheap as possible to get more people into the theater. I think a way that we can bring in people is with free food at the end of the show, it gives an incentive to people who have busy lives to give it a go. The food can be donated and cooked with help from local places like the local Latino Health Access which often helps the community in Santa Ana with free covid tests, vaccines, food drives, and different events. With their help and help from donors as well we can put on a production that feels like a family reunion, and that is exactly how I want this experience to feel. The run time of the whole production should last two weekends. I know that when the community comes together we tend to understand each other even more and I would love for this to be the chain reaction into that. With that being said, this production will not only bring awareness to the Latino community but also bring more Latinos into the theater world and tell a beautiful story all people should hear in the process.

As for the people I want to be involved in this production, that would vary. I’d like to get actors from the community in this production as well as directors. I think doing this will just give this production a more home-like experience. There would be auditions at least two to three months before the production. This would give the actors and management enough time to hone in on the division of the story. I have multiple actors who I know personally who would be great to audition for the role, one being Nadia Garza. She is a Freshman Drama Student at UCI with a great future ahead of her. I would love to see others audition and fall in love with the story and its message.

This production needs to happen in today’s day and age more than ever. It is a story that should be shared with many. The Latino community has not been near as recognized as it should and Las Mujeres del Mal is the perfect start to more and more Latino stories being told.