WCCO Viewers' Choice For Best Holiday Show In Minnesota
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- 'Tis the season to watch your favorite Christmas classic – "A Christmas Story." Now imagine bringing those memories to life with song and dance.
You voted "A Christmas Story, The Musical" the best holiday show in Minnesota. Sharon Hailey is the show's director and choreographer.
"We're lucky in that the movie was not a musical. So we have an awful lot of freedom to create and to invent what those numbers will be," Hailey said.
Just like the film, the Parker family takes center stage, fighting over leg lamps, an over-sized snowsuit and the desperate quest for a Red Ryder air rifle.
"I think everybody relates to it. I don't care if you're 80, I don't care if you're 12," Hailey said. "There's something in it that everybody relates to because the story is about love."
Jake Goodman plays Ralphie, James Ciccarelle plays Randy, Dieter Bierbrauer is dad and Billie Wildrick plays mom. They are one big, happy family.
"This show isn't the idealized Christmas, but yet it is," Wildrick said. "This family is quirky, you know. We're troubled, we fight, we have weird leg lamp things going on. But in the end, we get through this crazy Christmas and we sing a song about how it's perfect. It's exactly what it needed to be."
This is the musical's Midwest debut after opening on Broadway in 2012 and grabbing three Tony Award nominations.
"The show hasn't been done many places yet," Bierbrauer said. "It's fairly fresh. Even though, you know, the movie's been out there for a while, this version of it is, you know, we're still tearing little wrapping paper off of it."
With a cast that's nearly all local, it's the kids who steal the show.
"It's a wonderful story," Hailey said. "It's about community, it's about people loving one another, accepting one another, accepting each other for who you are and not what you want them to be," Hailey said.
You can check out "A Christmas Story, The Musical" at the Ordway through Dec. 28.
Click here for more information.
