Displaying items by tag: Tiffany Topol

Growing up our radio dial was tuned to one channel, K-Earth 101. In Southern California that station was the oldies, the classics, belting out hits from the 1950s and 60s; Sam Cooke, Buddy Hall, Mel Carter, Peggy Lee, The Ronettes, and so many more artists’ melodies and lyrics that are permanently tattooed on my brain. That music knowledge didn’t particularly help during middle school dances where 13 years olds grinded to The Bad Touch by The Bloodhound Gang but it did provide a solid foundation for an eclectic music playlist I continue to grow and curate today. Thanks to modern music apps we can now not only know the song but who sang it, and more astonishingly who wrote the music and lyrics. It is fascinating to find your favorite artists often wrote and composed songs for other artists, or your favorite songs are written by the same composer or produced by the same producer. It’s another level to musical appreciation that gets to the very heart and soul of the music. Music afficiandos loving to discover the artists behind the music will simply love Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, now playing at The Paramount Theatre. 

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical tells the story of Carole King, played by Tiffany Topol, and her musical journey and career. Starting out in Brookly we meet a 16-year-old aspiring songwriter in Carolee and journey through her early career composing music at 1650 Broadway for music publisher Donnie Kirshner, played by Ian Paul Custer. When she meets her future husband and lyricist Gerry Goffin, played by C.J. Blaine Eldred, we follow their early marriage and burgeoning careers as they team up to write some of the most iconic and lasting melodies and lyrics from huge 1960s artists like The Drifters and The Shirelles. Carole King’s career was filled with playful rivalries, endearing classics and emotional heartbreak but through it all she managed to see the beauty around her and become an era defining musician and artist and go on to become one of the most successful singer, songwriter and musicians in popular music history. 

First premiering in 2013, this modern musical is unlike any that you have ever seen. Synopsis and summaries about the play and captured in reviews are, in my humble opinion, purposely vague. The beauty of this musical is that it doesn’t have any original numbers nor does it sing-tell the story. Instead the writer Douglas McGrath uses King’s life story along with the music she wrote to show us her life, not tell us. He cleverly teases the music out, not immediately revealing the song, but having King or Goffin's characters slowly unveil the song to us. More satisfying than an unboxing video, the moment the first lyrics are sung or the melody tinkled on the piano keys, there is a collective and satisfying flutter of your heart, a spark in your brain at the recollection of the familiar song. It is made only more incredible as mini concerts within the play are performed by an incredible ensemble cast; The Righteous Brothers, performed by Luke Nowakowski, Matt Thinnes, The Shirelles performed by Marta Bady, Lydia Burke, Ariana Burks, Shelbi Voss, The Drifters, performed by Averis I. Anderson, Corey Barrow, Jared David Michael Grant, Calvin Scott Roberts, the incredibly talented ensemble cast embody the musical legends and perform just as they would have in the 1960s, fully immersing you into the heart and soul of King’s craft and talent. There is also a deep appreciation and respect for Carole King and how much influence she truly had on an entire generation of music, not counting her residual influence throughout her career with other artists. The satisfying, gratifying, and inspiring aspects of King’s life and influence is slowly unveiled to you as the audience and at times you’ll hardly be able to stay seated you’ll want to sing and dance along with the cast. The story telling is superb. It’s a love letter not only to King’s contribution to music but her rivals as well, Cythnia Weil and Barry Mann, played by Rebecca Hurd and Christopher Kale Jones respectively, and the music they all wrote that defined an era. You’ve never seen anything quite like Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. 

Going into this show I did not research Carole King's life story nor her songbook collection. I wanted to go in blind, knowing of the singer-songwriter but not being able to name many of her songs from memory. I had many people tell me what the musical was about and provide a brief summary of what it was about. All of their words failed to truly capture the magic and beauty of this show. I’m afraid my review will also fail to articulate and capture the true essence of the story. This Musical is like a song I must share with you but like a good song you cannot appreciate it until you hear it for yourself, experience it for yourself. If you see one show this summer, take a drive and enjoy the charming city of Aurora. Paramount Theatre is a gorgeous hidden gem nestled within the walkable and charming downtown community. It’s a perfect date night opportunity complete with theatre and live concerts mixed in. Theatre lovers will love the storytelling of the musical and music lovers will rejoice at the familiar melodies, only needing to resist singing along with the timeless classics. One fine day you’re gonna want to check off this musical from your list, don’t miss your chance to do so in 2024.

 Beautiful: The Carole King Musical is now playing at The Paramount Theatre in Aurora, Illinois and runs through June 16^th. Tickets are available at www.paramountaurora.com.

Carole King made more than beautiful music. She wrote the soundtrack to a generation with indelible songs like “You’ve Got a Friend,” “Natural Woman,” “Late,” “I Feel the Earth Move,” “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” and “So Far Away.”

Not so far away is Paramount Theatre’s 2023-24 season finale, the Broadway smash hit Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. Nominated for seven Tony Awards, with two wins, plus a Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album, Paramount will pull out all the stops in this season-finale jukebox musical celebration of one our most beloved music icons ever.

Performances are April 24-June 16. Opening Night is Friday, May 3 at 8 p.m. For tickets and information, visit paramountaurora.com, call (630) 896-6666.

Before she was the Carole King we know today, she was a young songwriter from Brooklyn trying to make a name for herself. Beautiful tells the inspiring true story of her remarkable rise to stardom with her husband and songwriting partner, Gerry Goffin, and how she went on to become one of the most successful singers, songwriters and musicians in contemporary music history. 

Paramount’s new production of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical will be directed by Paramount Theatre Artistic Director Jim Corti and Johanna McKenzie Miller, in her Paramount directorial debut.

Returning to Paramount in the title role of Carole King is Tiffany Topol, a multi-talented singer, songwriter, producer and performer based in New York and Chicago. Paramount audiences will recall Topol for her Jeff-nominated performance in 2018 as Girl in Once. Topol’s other credits include the first National Tours of Xanadu and Once, Sweet Charity at Writers’ Theatre, Shining Lives at Northlight Theatre and Eastland at Lookingglass. 

The principal cast also features C.J. Blaine Eldred as Gerry Goffin, Rebecca Hurd as Cynthia Weil, Christopher Kale Jones as Barry Mann, Ian Paul Custer as Donny Kirshner and Laura T. Fisher as Genie Klein. The ensemble (at press time) includes Averis Anderson, Marta Bady, Corey Barlow, Corey Barrow, Lydia Burke, Ariana Burks, Michaela Dukes, Jared David Michael Grant, Conor Jordan, Clare Kennedy, Kevin Kuska, Donna Louden, Yasir Muhammad, Luke Nowakowski, Colleen Perry, Calvin Scott Roberts, Abby C. Smith, Matt Thinnes and Shelbi Voss.

Per usual, Paramount has assembled a stellar design and production team to create a night of Beautiful theater including Kenny Ingram, choreographer; Kory Danielson, music director and conductor; Jeffrey D. Kmiec, scenic designer; Theresa Ham, costume designer; Greg Hofmann, lighting designer; Adam Rosenthal, sound designer; Katie Cordts, wig, hair and makeup designer; Jesse Gaffney, properties designer; Ethan Deppe, electronic music designer; Erin Barnett, assistant choreographer; Celia Villacres, associate music director and associate conductor; Jaci Entwisle, stage manager; and Madeline M. Scott and Lanita VanderSchaaf, assistant stage managers.

Times, Dates and Ticket Information

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical starts previews Wednesday, April 24 at 7 p.m. Opening Night is Friday, May 3 at 8 p.m. Performances run through June 16: Wednesdays at 1:30 p.m. and 7 p.m.; Thursdays at 7 p.m.; Fridays at 8 p.m.; Saturdays at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.; Sundays at 1 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. Run time is approximately 2 hours 30 minutes with intermission.

Paramount Theatre is located at 23 E. Galena Blvd. in downtown Aurora. For tickets and information, visit paramountaurora.com, call (630) 896-6666, or stop by the Paramount box office, Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and until show time on show days. For group discounts, contact Melissa Striedl, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or (630) 723-2461. 

For the latest updates, follow @paramountaurora on Facebook and Instagram, and Paramount Theatre on LinkedIn. 

Pay What You Can Performances

Paramount will offer two Pay What You Can performances of Beautiful: Thursday, April 25 at 7 p.m., and Saturday, April 27 at 3 p.m. Both days, starting at 10 a.m., visit the Paramount box office in-person to request tickets. Limit four per person. Subject to availability. See paramountaurora.com/pay-what-you-can for details. 

Access Services

Paramount offers assistive listening devices free of charge at all performances. Check in at the coat room before the show to borrow a listening device.

Paramount will offer American Sign Language interpretation on Friday, June 7 at 8 p.m. and open captioning on Wednesday, June 12 at 1:30 p.m.

If you require wheelchair or special seating or other assistance, please contact the box office at (630) 896-6666 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. in advance.

Behind the scenes of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical

Pop music would be very different without the contributions of Carole King, who at age 17 wrote her first #1 song with Gerry Goffin, “Will You Love me Tomorrow,” for the Shirelles. The dozens of hits Goffin and King wrote during this period became legendary, but it was 1971’s “Tapestry” that took King to the pinnacle, speaking to her contemporaries and providing a spiritual background to the decade. More than 400 of her compositions have been recorded by over 1,000 artists, resulting in 100 hit singles and six Grammys. She was recognized in 2015 by the Kennedy Center Honors for her unparalleled influence on American culture. King was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical features a book by Douglas McGrath that tells the inspiring true story of King’s early life and career, using songs that she wrote, often together with Gerry Goffin, and other contemporary songs by Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil, Phil Spector and others. Orchestrations, vocal and incidental music arrangements are by Steve Sidwall. 

The original production of Beautiful received its world premiere in October 2013 at the Curran Theatre, San Francisco, with direction by Marc Bruni and choreography by Josh Prince, starring Chicago’s own Jessie Mueller. It debuted on Broadway in January 2014 at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, earning seven Tony nominations and two wins, including a Tony for Mueller for best leading actress in a musical for her portrayal of Carole King. 

About Paramount’s upcoming production, Artistic Director Jim Corti said, “Collaborating with co-director Johanna McKenzie Miller, choreographer Kenny Ingram, and music director Kory Danielson, we’re set up for singer/songwriter, and music producer herself, Tiffany Topol, to star and lead us into a nuanced reveal of the great Carole King."

"From her little known personal story and trailblazing professional career, from her start as a 17-year-old songwriter for hire to her triumphant Carnegie Hall concert in 1971, the year she was the first woman ever to win four Grammy Awards for her record breaking album 'Tapestry,' which remained the bestseller by a female artist for a quarter century. Take a seat and ride with us for her rise to self realization as a pop music powerhouse while continuing her work and desire toward life as a wife and mother. As she honors and owns her fearless and true gift, witness the start of how Carole King becomes one of the most celebrated and iconic singer/songwriters of all time!”

Paramount Artistic Director Jim Corti will co-direct Paramount’s production of Beautiful. Corti inaugurated Paramount’s Broadway Series with President and CEO Tim Rater in fall 2011 with the critically acclaimed My Fair Lady and a subscriber base of 12,500 patrons. In 2015, Paramount’s Broadway Series became Jeff Award eligible. Since then, Paramount has garnered 115 nominations with 29 wins, including three consecutive Best Large Musical awards for Les Misérables, West Side Story and Sweeney Todd. Corti helmed all three, and won Best Director for two of them, Les Misérables and Sweeney Todd. Corti also directed Paramount’s Fiddler on the Roof, Miss Saigon, RENT, The Who’s Tommy, Oklahoma!, Mamma Mia!, Million Dollar Quartet, Once, The Producers, Newsies, Groundhog Day: The Musical, Next to Normal, and co-directed Into the Woods and Fun Home. A Broadway veteran, he appeared in the original New York casts of Ragtime and Candide, joined the long running A Chorus Line, and toured nationally in Urinetown, Cabaret and Bob Fosse’s Dancin’. Other highlights include being the only director to have two productions in the same year in the Chicago Tribune’s 2009 list of 10 Best Shows for Drury Lane’s Cabaret and Writers Theatre’s Oh, Coward! He remains the sole honoree to have won Jeff Awards as an actor (Marriott’s Grand Hotel), choreographer (Drury Lane’s Singin’ in the Rain) and director (Paramount’s Sweeney Todd and Les Misérables, Drury Lane’s Sweet Charity and Northlight’s Blues in the Night). In addition to Beautiful, Corti is also directing Paramount’s BOLD Series spring 2024 revival of A Streetcar Named Desire with Elizabeth Swanson, March 13-April 21 at Paramount’s Copley Theatre.

Johanna McKenzie Miller (co-director) is making her Paramount debut with Beautiful. Most recently she directed Shrek at Music Theatre Works. Other directing credits include Steel Magnolias (Jeff Award, Best Ensemble Play-Large), The 39 Steps and Shrek (TYA) at Drury Lane Theatre; Kiss Me, Kate, The Wizard of Oz (TYA), Junie B. Jones (TYA) and Elephant & Piggie’s We Are in a Play! (TYA) at Marriott Theatre; A Peculiar Inheritance and Romance en Route, the 91st and 92nd Annual Waa-Mu shows at Northwestern University; How to Lobster with Steppenwolf LookOut series, and Shrew’d! with First Folio Theatre. McKenzie Miller is the co-founder and artistic director of Lombard Children’s Theater Workshop.