StarlightTheatre.org
Title
Starlight Musical Theatre
Description
San Diego Civic Light Opera Association is one of the oldest continuously producing musical theatre companies in the United States. Starlight was founded in 1945 by Charlie Cannon, William Dean, Julius Leib and Robert J. Sullivan. Starlight Musical Theatre, presented its first season in 1946 with Gilbert & Sullivan's Mikado, presented in the San Diego Zoo's Wegeforth Bowl. It was followed by productions of The Chocolate Soldier, H.M.S. Pinafore, Naughty Marietta, The Barber of Seville, and Hansel and Gretel.
Since its inception, Starlight has presented 54 seasons of musical theatre productions for the entertainment of more than four million San Diegans and visitors. These seasons have encompassed nearly 1000 productions of 120 different musicals, ranging from the operettas of Gilbert & Sullivan and Jacques Offenbach, the Rodgers & Hammerstein classics Carousel and South Pacific, favorites of the 50's and 60's such as West Side Story, Guys & Dolls, and Peter Pan, and the contemporary Broadway blockbusters A Chorus Line, Dreamgirls , Follies, and Phantom of the Opera.
In 1946, during the first Starlight production of The Mikado at Wegeforth Bowl in the Zoo, stage manager, Harry A. Hays was asked to find something regal for the bride to carry when she ran off to get married. Harry looked everywhere and finally the costumer, Ruby Kissman gave him her red sewing box, which she tied with a beautiful gold tasseled cord. That night was a particularly fine performance to a sell-out crowd. Producer Billy Dean, a man of long standing theatrical experience and therefore great superstition, decreed that the RED BOX must appear on stage in every successive performance of this start-up company.
Languages
English
Contact
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- San Diego California
- United States 92163
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- +1.6195447827
