A Cinderella Story Once Upon A Song Songs

[Lucretia]

OurEvil Step Mother is Jane Lynch, and she is a sort of washed up Pop singer. We also have the over the top step sisters. Basically the same from before but the step sisters a tad more tolerable this time and I like the Step Mother about the same but a tad more because of Jane Lynch.

Later at home the Step Sisters tell Mary they figured it was her at the ball. How did they find out? Never explained. Bah. They tell her not to approach him or they will leak that tape from earlier, which now has a point.

Both Step Sisters find out the sisters from her computer (behind each others backs) and approach him the next day. By the way, one of the songs is a Shakira song which is s funny/creepy foreshadowing.

They have a moment and the next day Mary has an audition for some big dance thing. This is what the plot is about now. They set it up earlier at least but yeah, them getting together a tad early means things get kinda boring from here on out.

Said montage is kind of nice, to be fair. They bond some more until one night Mary gets a note telling her to meet up with him. She goes to his place but sees this Alpha Bitch that works with the sisters talking to him.

Some of it needed for the plot but do we need some random guy and then later Dustin dancing for a few minutes? Eventually Joey gets up there for some filler dancing and he has Mary get on stage with him.

This means she gets away from Step Mom who broke her legs in a pratfall. Her going crazy from Mary leaving is funny and slightly sad. Weird. Anyway, Mary leaves with Joey to cap off this poorly written story.

Joey is even worse and the rest just fill their roles. Some can do play them fine like Step Mom but they are still thinly written. On the bright side, the acting is good and they can bring some charm to some moments.

Once, and also many times, a melody has landed amongst us and brought the shape of the mountains, the valleys, the rivers with it into a small room. We gather under the roof, by the fire, between the walls to marvel at this impossible feat of transformation. How does it all fit? Even when we are surrounded by concrete, trapped in the glass and steel, tangled in wires and flashing signs, a song can have us drinking the fresh waters of a cool stream. Is it any less miraculous simply because it is ordinary? In the presence of a song, somehow, even a cage might become an instrument, an organ thrumming with possibility, revolution.

Once upon a night after night after night, I climbed into the pumpkin carriage with four friends. The song sat amongst us, our Cinderella, dusted off and shining in her silver-tone gown. Look at us mice, transformed into coachmen, along for the ride, accompanying her to the ball. The carriage is also a van. Tonight, the ball is at the Turf Club in St. Paul, Minnesota, or maybe the Hi-Fi in Indianapolis, or the Owl Parlor in Brooklyn. Will Cinderella find her prince in these places? That person who listens and truly hears?

Once, another time, a stranger passed through town and picked a sewing needle out of a stacked tower of golden hay. I wonder if I am the needle, taking the thread through the eye, piercing and piecing the fabric together into some strange quilt. Or am I the hands that feed the old Singer machine, hunching my back and squinting for the sake of some larger vision? The old stories remind us: Beware of pricked fingers, of enchanted sleeps, of perfection, of jealousy.

In the future, there will be music. I know this because songs are wily time travelers. They move forward and backward and all around the edges and margins and also right in the Times Squares of everything. Once upon a time, I thought a song was enough. I know better now. A song is more than that. A song is a bright candle and also invisible. It is the thread, it is the wheel, it is the door, it is the difference.

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Yet the production of the musical playing through August 20 at Broadway Rose Theatre managed to both dazzle and tickle me, and even brought a tear to my eye. I was right there with appreciative audience members of all ages.

It may help more reluctant audience members to put the show into context. The original television musical by the fabled duo of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein (think Oklahoma!, Carousel, The Sound of Music, and The King and I) premiered in 1959 starring Julie Andrews in the title role. The version that hit me in the sweet spot of girlhood premiered on television in 1965, and starred Lesley Ann Warren; I distinctly recall watching it any chance I got, so much so that the songs came back to me after more than four decades.

The show had been remounted several times before the version now on stage at Broadway Rose, which premiered as a revival on Broadway in 2013. In that version, the book was updated by Douglas Carter Beane to put some light meat on the bones of the story.

Good staging and direction holds the magic well. This 22-person cast capitalizes on the scale of its production numbers; it is full of capable dancers, the choreography is playful, and the action never drags.

Finally, the costumes here deserve a deep bow of respect. Lovers of beautiful gowns will have plenty to marvel about here; the designers here (Travis Grant, with Maine State Music Theatre) have taken seriously the task of building a dreamworthy world.

The audience response was enthusiastic. I sat next to an older couple who held hands and murmured appreciation throughout the entire show, and spent the hour following the show unpacking every detail with a very appreciative seven-year-old. Cinderella is based on an archetypal story, and even without aiming for depth, this musical stokes deep attachments. Even the most cynical audience members may find themselves wiping away a tear or two.

The movie's central message (other than that cruelty will eventually be repaid by justice) is that you should never be afraid to follow your passion or use your gifts. Both Katie and Luke are suppressed by controlling (and in Katie's case abusive) guardians, but they persevere and are eventually able to show off their musical talent.

The grown-ups are all negative role models: Gail is cruel and moneygrubbing, Luke's father is doesn't listen to him, and the guru is a quack. Katie is selfless but a bit too self-effacing; she doesn't ever stand up to her stepmother until prodded by Luke, who's a good role model for following your own dreams rather than those imposed on you by your parents.

Teens go out on a date and nearly kiss. Another couple flirts and ends up sharing a couple of kisses. The word "hot" is used a few times to describe girls. In one scene, a prank leaves a girl naked, but viewers only see her shoulders and legs. A boy makes jokes about "partial nudity."

Some insults like "idiots," "freakin'," "stupid," and "crap." The stepmother makes cruel comments about nearly everyone. She calls her daughter "untalented" and tells her stepdaughter that she'll never amount to anything. The stepmother also calls a girl "an Asian dwarf" and pretty much says something unkind every time she speaks. Her own young son calls her a "beeyotch."

Parents need to know that this is the third take on a familiar tale, A Cinderella Story. Like the first two movies, this one follows a talented-but-put-upon Cinderella stand-in who lives under the tyrannical rule of a mean stepmother. The teen romance is mild and only includes two sweet kisses, but the protagonist endures quite a lot of emotional -- and verbal -- abuse from her humorous-but-cruel parental figure. The stepmother character, however, gets hers in the end, and at the very least, this Cinderella has unexpected allies who help her triumph. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails.

Katie Gibbs (Lucy Hale) is a gifted singer-songwriter, but before she can head off to music school for college, she must endure one final year under the emotionally abusive supervision of her "evil stepmother" Gail (Missi Pyle) and bratty stepsiblings. Gail, who's the headmistress of Katie's private school, has landed a star transfer pupil, Luke (Freddie Stroma), the handsome son of a billionaire music producer. A condition of his attendance is that Luke produce the school's annual talent show. When fame-hungry Gail realizes that Katie is much more talented than her own daughter, she forces Katie to sing songs that stepsister Bev (Megan Park) will lip-sync during the big show. Katie agrees, but watching Bev and Luke get cozy over her own songs nearly breaks her heart.

This third installment in Warner Bros.' popular Cinderella Story franchise is as sugary sweet and entertaining as the others -- which is to say, fluffy and cute, not deep and enduring. Tween girls will delight in Hale (star of Pretty Little Liars) and Stroma's (who memorably played the cocky Cormac McLaggen in Harry Potter) attraction at first listen, and parents will approve of how their relationship develops in an almost Cyrano de Bergerac fashion -- a meeting of like-minded artists, not teens in hormonal overdrive.

Unlike other Cinderella adaptations, Katie's stepsiblings aren't always cruel, but the stepmother is completely cold-hearted. Pyle is definitely the movie's top scene-stealer, with her pinched smile and narrowed eyes. She's the kind of character actress who deserves a starring comedy or sitcom role but instead has to settle for these supporting gigs. Pyle's love-to-hate-her performance, combined with Hale and Stroma's adorable leads, makes this a perfect sleepover pick for girls who haven't graduated to PG-13 romances.

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