Galveston Island Outdoor Musicals

[HOUFlip04]

Posted: 7/26/06 at 10:15pm

This was a summer stock company that I was a part of for a few seasons. Some broadway and national tour performers were leads in the show and some people made it to Broadway and national tours after. It's pretty much a place where someone know someone who did shows there for at least one summer.

Here are some of the people who got to Broadway or were already on Broadway -

Robert Gallagher - Javert in Les Miserables, Forbidden Broadway
Marie Danvers - Christine in "Phantom of the Opera"
Skip Harris - Original company of "Sweeney Todd"
Ann Sanders - Belle in "Beauty and the Beast", currently Christmas Eve in "Avenue Q"
Dontee Kiehn - 42nd Street revival, Gypsy w/ Bernadette Peters
Michelle Potterf - Chicago
Mark Arvin (RIP)- Chicago, Fosse, Swing, Moving Out

There's probably more I'm forgetting. But does anyone know anyone who worked at GIOM?

[Chevstriss]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:29am

Jeanne Jones went into Will Rogers Follies
Michelle Tibbitts toured w/ Hello Dolly and when it opened on Bwy last.

[ErinDillyFan]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 10:21am

Very good talent there. I saw "South Pacific" there in the 90s.

Real planes flying over head was an unusual special effect. I am not sure if it was just coincidence.

[Calvin]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 10:44am

I used to go to those, but I found it very hard to concentrate. The talent was usually great, but the setting was awful: people walking around in front of you to get popcorn, a sound system that worked only some of the time and those terrible Gulf Coast mosquitoes.

I hear they've changed the venue for the better, however. Someone somewhat well-known was in a recent production of Hello Dolly! (last summer, I think). It might have been Judy Norton, but I can't remember. I didn't see it; my parents told me about it.

[HOUFlip04]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:02pm

Thanks, Chevtriss! Hope you are doing well. I forgot about Jeanne and Michelle. Also, Robert Ari, who played Tevye in Fiddler, played Inspector Barnes in the recent revival of Bells Are Ringing.

ErinDillyFan, I did the second summer they did "South Pacific" in the 90's - so you might have seen me play in the pivotal role of Henri, the polynesian butler of Emile DeBeque (played by Jack Dabdoub - another Broadway veteran).

Calvin - Yeah, all the GIOM actors had the same opinion as you. It was hard to perform with a sea of people walking around getting popcorn and drinks. Talent was always good, but as time went on - the talent declined. I no longer performed and snuck in to see shows and was really disappointed in the talent and production values pretty much sucked!

[Calvin]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:08pm

I saw that "South Pacific" production.

[HOUFlip04]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:27pm

Great! That was a great production and fit the venue very well. Unfortunately, the theatre was in major debt and that was the reason for the decline. I heard they were not paying chorus people and just offering comp tickets.

They moved the theatre to an indoor theatre in the Moody Gardens, but the talent and production values have not improved. I hear "Mary Ellen" from the Waltons is direction a musical revue that I think she wrote herself.

[TxTwoStep]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:31pm

I have seen a few shows over the past couple of years. I did like some of the last years outdoors that it was mainly very talented college students---and that even the orchestra was college students, which is great training. I usually see somewhat amazing dance there too. Haven't seen that much indoors. It's mainly a ballroom converted to a theatre, not the best venue.

[HOUFlip04]

Posted: 7/27/06 at 12:40pm

You know I stand corrected, TxTwoStep. I really only saw the shows a couple summers after I stopped auditioning there. But I do know that a certain director/choreographer did shows there and so I know that the talent would have improved with him there. Certainly in the part of casting great dancers!

[Chevstriss]

Posted: 8/5/06 at 1:42pm

I totally lost track of what went on there after Yockey moved up to take over Casa. But what is this orchestra to which you refer? We were strictly on click tracks. Even the chorus was on click track. makes me cringe in embarassment remembering. the excuse was that instruments wouldn't stay in tune out doors. hmmmm. OK.

[TxTwoStep]

Posted: 8/5/06 at 1:48pm

since they moved indoors, I think they are back on the clicktracks, or synthesizer keyboard. For a couple of years toward the end of the outdoor productions (maybe two or three years ago) the orch was live and was mainly college students, just as the cast was. The shows were pretty good, not great production values, but energetic dancing particularly and some fine singing. The student pit seemed to have no trouble with staying in tune.

I do recall hearing that "back in the day" GOM spent a lot of money on symphony recordings of the golden musicals to use as accompaniment, maybe even the London Symphony. They may have been relying on those lately for the "chestnut" productions of things like FAIR LADY and DOLLY last season; not really familiar with titles this season, though I heard maybe 42nd STREET was among them. The crowd that now seems drawn to the Convention Center for the shows is fairly older and conservative, so war horse titles and musical revues around themes (like country music, movie music, or patriotic music) seem to play well. Very Branson-esque.

[dfwactor]

Posted: 3/10/08 at 6:29pm

I had friends who worked there. Tried to get in but they usually did not have many Equity contracts to go around. I did see some of the shows there and thought they were amazing! I saw shows outdoors that had soundtracks and later when they air conditioned the pit. That was the sticking point for the live orchestra in the humid gulf air. Real musicians would not expose their decent instruments to the elements. Once Yockey spent the money on the pit, all of that changed. I had a relative play in the pit and he was no college student. They were mostly college professors and musicians who played on the side as a second gig.

I have not been down there in years. Now that they are indoors, they are like everyone else. Part of the attraction of the shows was seeing them under the stars and such with trees moving in the breeze.

They were funded by the Moody family. Once the members of the family who cared about theatre died off, their funds were cut.

Too bad. It was a great place to see the old classics. Sorry bumping this old thread. Just joined and spending the day on here.