Darling Archives ⋆ Brett Ryback

DARLING at A.C.T.

From June 14-June 29th, DARLING will be performed by American Conservatory Theatre’s (A.C.T.) Young Conservatory (YC) at The Theater at the Children’s Creativity Museum (221 4th Street, San Francisco).

At A.C.T.’s Tony Award–winning YC, students ages 8 to 19 develop their talents, perform in professional-caliber productions, and gain the confidence to succeed—all in a creative, fun, and encouraging environment. The ten sessions of classes and eight public productions offered throughout the year are designed to develop talent and creativity, as well as communication and cooperation skills, for young people with all levels of theater background. Working professional actors and directors lead students in a spectrum of classes, including acting, directing, voice and speech, musical theater, audition, and improvisation.

Directed by YC Director Craig Slaight and Domenique Lozano, DARLING features a talented young cast from across the San Francisco Bay Area.

If you’re in the Bay Area, please take this opportunity to see DARLING!

Tickets are $20 and available by calling the A.C.T. Box Office at 415.749.2228 or going online to www.act-sf.org/ycshows.

DARLING wins New Musical Award

The Weston Playhouse Theatre Company is pleased to announce Darling as the winner of its seventh annual New Musical Award.

Written by Ryan Scott Oliver and Brett Ryback, Darling is a coming-of-age story about teenager Ursula Morgan, who leaves behind her upper-class family and finds herself in the seedy underground of Depression-era Boston — a world of sex, jazz and a mysterious drug called….fairy dust.

The piece, which was featured on the “Bound for Broadway” episode of NBC’s The Apprentice, was nominated for Weston’s prestigious national award by Director of Music at Pace New Musicals Robert Meffe who said of Darling: “The rock score is dark, edgy and contagious… The lyrics are intelligent, surprising and original…The book is a wildly different take on the Peter Pan story that will have audiences trying to uncover the allusions every night.”

The Weston Playhouse New Musical Award, the only one of its kind in the country, has become a highly sought-after prize. It supports new work by writers and composers of notable promise, chosen from a group of national nominations. Winners rehearse their work in Vermont under professional musical direction with a cast of exceptional actor/singers. After performing selections from Darling in concert on the Weston stage on March 2, Oliver, Ryback and their cast return to New York to perform at an invited concert and then to record a demo cd under the supervision of Kurt Deutsch of Sh-K-Boom Records.

The Vermont and New York concerts will be led under the musical direction of Chris Fenwick (Giant). The cast of rising Broadway talent includes Derek Klena (Dogfight) as Peter, Emily Walton (Peter and the Starcatcher) as Ursula, Julia Mattison (Godspell), Justin Keyes (How to Succeed…) and Max Chernin (NYMF’s Really Bad Things).

Continue reading DARLING wins New Musical Award

From the DARLING Sketchbook

Here’s one for the fans of my musical Darling, with Music & Lyrics by Ryan Scott Oliver.

For those unacquainted with the show, Darling is a dark deconstruction of the Peter Pan story as told from the perspective of the “Wendy” character. The show has gone through many different incarnations, and the current version resembles Peter Pan mostly in broad, thematic ways.

However, when first conceived, the show borrowed a lot more from the original J.M. Barrie story – including the characters John and Michael Darling. Also, in the original stages of conception, it was not immediately apparent that Ryback and Oliver would work exclusively on either Book or Music/Lyrics.

Thus – this sketch of a song meant to be sung by John to his younger brother Michael was created by me. I pulled it out of the drawer and recently set it to music for my concert The Kid With the Keys, which premiered this fall in Los Angeles.

Be sure to tell me what you think in the comments below!

DARLING EARNS 10 EVVY NOMINATIONS

This past March, my musical DARLING had a workshop production at Emerson College, Boston. That production has since been nominated for 10 Evvy Awards.

The EVVY Awards, modeled after professional shows such as the EMMYs and Oscars, have become the largest student-produced, multi-camera, live switch event in the nation. This award winning show has become nationally recognized with a first place award at the National Association of College Broadcasters awards and has received two national Telly Awards.
Throughout the year, student work can be submitted in a wide variety of categories, creating a very competitive environment right here on campus. These submissions are then sent out to professional judges in their respective field to ensure a fair and experienced judging process.

In addition to all acting categories, DARLING was also nominated for Outstanding Direction, Choreography, Lighting, Scenic, and Sound Designs, and Outstanding Theatrical Production.

Haley Vigil was also nominated for Oustanding Costume Design, which includes these fantastic designs:

Many congratulations to director Michael Bello, producer Jacob Porter, and the fantastic cast and crew of DARLING: Emerson!

The Evvy Awards are distributed May 12th, at 7pm EST, and the ceremony will be broadcast live on their site.

Developmental Production of Darling, A New Musical, to be produced at Emerson College

BOSTON, MA – Retrop Productions and Emerson College’s RareWorks Theatre Company, in association with Kurt Deutsch, President and Founder of Sh-K Boom Records, are pleased to announce their collaboration with Ryan Scott Oliver and BT Ryback on the new musical Darling. A private workshop of this new piece will be presented at Emerson College in December, with a developmental production occurring in early Spring of 2012.

Jacob Porter, President of Retrop Productions, remarked on the collaborative opportunity: “Having [Ryan Scott Oliver] and [B.T. Ryback] present for the developmental process will be a beneficial learning experience for the entire Emerson student community and will provide the authors with information that will aid the creation of this daring and bold new work.” Nick Medvescek, Producing Director for RareWorks Theatre Company, adds “this production allows us to link our student community to industry leaders and rising talent.”

Darling, A New Musical will be directed by Michael Bello, a senior BFA Musical Theatre Major at Emerson College. Bello has previously worked as an assistant director at Theatreworks in Palo Alto, CA and for Mary Zimmerman at the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston. Bello believes that “bringing a new musical, like Darling, to Emerson will provide every student involved with a unique and educational challenge to work on a piece unlike any other student organization musical.”

Darling is presented in association with Kurt Deutsch, President and Founder Sh-K-Boom Records, a Grammy Award winning label that bridges the gap between rock and theater music. Deutsch is looking forward to this exciting collaboration at Emerson, and stated that “there is nothing like being part of the creation of a new musical and working with two of the most exciting young musical theatre writers. I think that Darling represents where the future of musical theatre is going deeply rooted in traditional storytelling through music but by someone whose influences range from Sondheim to the popular music of today.”

Ryan Scott Oliver, composer and lyricist for Darling, speaks on behalf of the creative collaboration with book-writer BT Ryback: “We’re really looking forward to our work with the Emerson team this year. To be able to not only read thru the material but then have the opportunity to revise it and have it up on its feet in production is an exceptional opportunity. The university setting is a blessing to workshop a show like Darling, and Brett [BT Ryback] and I are anxious to see our show take her next step forward.”

This exciting collaboration highlights the importance of developing new musical theater within an educational environment; providing both student and professional theatre artists with the opportunity to work, learn, and grow in a creative and stimulating climate.

More about Darling
Darling, with music and lyrics by Ryan Scott Oliver, and book by B.T. Ryback, follows upper crust teenager Ursula Morgan in 1929 Boston as its society boils in the weeks before the Crash. Neglected by her excessive, self-absorbed parents, Ursula encounters Peter, a charming rent-boy of uncertain age, on the run from the Captain of Police who pursues him for a heinous crime he may or may not have committed. When she is offered the
opportunity to run away with him, she takes it and finds herself swept into a seedy underground of jazz, sex and a mysterious white powder called Fairy Dust.