Illyria

Illyria - the musical version of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night - is a show that I saw in conjunction with the New York Musical Theatre Festival this past Monday night.

It was a concert reading, meaning all of the actors perform with scripts in hand and you are required to use a bit of imagination to envision the production. I have to say, I love readings - I find them to be the purest form of theatre and just really enjoyable.

The cast is delightful. Steve Wilson as Duke Orsino is hilarious! He seems like he could have walked off the pages of a fairy tale, a la the prince in Beauty and the Beast. Jonathan Groff is great as Sebastian (it's pretty impossible not to like him after seeing Spring Awakening) and the remainder of the cast is just as great. All of the music is easy to listen to and quite funny. My favorite number was a song that Viola sings about her love for Orsino called Patience.

Hopefully this show gets staged again in full form - it's fantastic!