A new jukebox musical featuring the work of late Broadway and pop songwriter Allee Willis is in development, and made a world premiere bow at Virginia's North Street Playhouse last month.
Written by James Berg and Stan Zimmerman (Gilmore Girls), Long Beach Blanket Bingo features a score gathered from Willis' song catalogue, though mostly never-before-heard tunes that previously only had been recorded as demos. Willis, who collaborated on the score of Broadway's The Color Purple with Stephen Bray and Brenda Russell, is also a writer of such pop hits as the theme song for Friends and Earth, Wind & Fire's "September."
The musical tells an original story conceived after Zimmerman and Berg realized that none of the campy beach movie-musicals of the '60s features Black people. The work follows a Black female surfer and a naïve white boy both on a segregated beach in Southern California in 1965, imagining if a campy beach movie told an authentic story that actually reflected what was going on in the real world at the time.
The world premiere cast, all Virginia locals, featured Jesse Burdette, Faith Marhsall, Marquez Rew, Reese Ensor, Aria Taylor, Andrea Ann, Delaney Petka, Sean Thomas, Unique Bailey, T Monchel Finney, Alex Holt, Javon Smith, and Ashley Aigner Antunes. Petka was also Zimmerman's production assistant, and Ginny McMath was assistant director and musical consultant. Natasha Smoot music directed, and orchestrations were by Bryan Blaskie. Zimmerman was at the helm.
“I was very excited about the prospect of our theatre having the opportunity to work with Stan on the premiere of Long Beach Blanket Bingo, but could not have anticipated what an extraordinary experience our entire community would be a part of," says North Street Artistic Director Terry Bliss in a statement. "And, I could not be more thrilled that our veteran adult and student actors had the opportunity to be introduced to Allee Willis’s music through this beautiful production."
Zimmerman and Berg are looking to mount at least one more production before bringing the work to New York for a workshop. The team is looking for performing arts high schools and colleges for the project's next developmental step.
Long Beach Blank Bingo is the third collaboration between North Street and Zimmerman, following earlier productions of Zimmerman's Right Before I Go (set to make an Off-Broadway bow next month) and Yes, Virginia. Berg and Zimmerman's previous co-writing credits include episodes of The Golden Girls, Roseanne, Gilmore Girls, Rita Rocks, The Brady Bunch Movie, and the 1999 TV movie version of Annie.
