Last week, while in town for the concert reading of NAKED IN AMERICA -- THE MUSICAL, I went to see THE PIRATE QUEEN at the Cadillac Palace Theatre. With book by Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg, music by Claude-Michel Schonberg, andl yrics by Alain Boublil and John Dempsey, THE PIRATE QUEEN was directed by Frank Galati and Choreographed by Mark Dendy.

It was cool to find out that Schonberg was born of Hungarian parents! Not surprising that a Hungarian wrote the music for the most popular musical in the world, LES MISERABLES!

I was excited to see Stephanie J. Block as Grace O'Malley -- "Grania", the real-life 16th century pirate who fights for Ireland (and love, of course). I loved her as Liza Minnelli in THE BOY FROM OZ. She was unbelievable! Totally amazing. I wish I had seen her as Elphaba in WICKED. She has a an amazing stage presence, and a fabulous voice. She also is very physical and gets hoisted up, hanging off rigging a lot!

It was really fun to see Richard Todd Adams who played Brett Mansford in PLANE CRAZY at NYMF 2005. He's in the ensemble, and understudies one of the main characters, the evil Bingham. Canuck Jennifer Waiser, also an ensemble member, played Little Sally in URINETOWN in Toronto. I had first seen her in one of Michael Rubinoff's Cityscapes Cabarets in Toronto.

I was milling around the lobby waiting for the house to open when I spied my old tap teacher! She isn't old (she's younger than I am!) but it was a while ago that I took tap! I went up to her and said hello. I think I might have freaked her out a bit! Turns out she was working on the show. Tara Young is the associate director of THE PIRATE QUEEN! Wow, small world.

There is some amazing dancing in the show, especially the "River Dance" Irish dancing in the show. And what a cast -- by my count there are 47 people in the show! They are all superb. Grania's father, Dubhdara, is played by Jeff McCarthy whose voice sounded so familiar to me. Then I looked in the program and discovered he was Officer Lockstock in URINETOWN. Hadley Fraser who plays Grania's love interest Tiernan also has an amazing voice.

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