Last year The Wallis staged a revival of Blues in the Night under the direction of the man who first conceived the musical in 1980 – Sheldon Epps. The show was so popular it was extended and now it has found a new home at the Laguna Playhouse where Blues in the Night will play through March 10th.
Director Epps was previously the Artistic Director at the Pasadena Playhouse. After the premiere of Blues in the Night in 1980, the show made it to Broadway in 1982 and received a Tony nomination as Best Musical. The show tells, through mostly song, the story of three woman and their different relationships with the same jackass of a man. Two of the women in this production were in the show at the Wallis Annenberg: Yvette Cason and Paulette Ivory. Once again the no-good man is played by Chester Gregory. New to the cast here is Jenna Gillespie.
Amongst the songs included in Blues in the Night are “Lover Man,” “Am I Blue?,””Wild Women Don’t Have the Blues” and, of course, “Blues in the Night.”
We saw the show at the Wallis and can guarantee that Blues in the Night is the perfect show for anyone who loves great songs (some better-known than others) performed brilliantly by this four-person cast.
