Marvelettes Musical

[Emerald City]

Mosaic Signs, Seals and Delivers with Motown

February 23, 2005 - General Motors and the internationally-acclaimed Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit present the world premiere of Now That I Can Dance - Motown, 1962, an original play spotlighting the early days of Motown Records and Motown's first girl group, the Marvelettes. The play will debut Friday, May 13 th at the DFT at the Detroit Institute of Arts.


Now That I Can Dance - Motown, 1962
follows the dramatic real-life story of five teenagers from Inkster who would go on to perform Motown's first #1 hit. This energetic production features many of Motown's hit songs and brings to life both the glamour and the sometimes harsh realities of Motown's early days. Many of the themes explored in the play are still relevant to teenagers today.

Founder and CEO, Rick Sperling, who has worked closely with the Youth Ensemble during the play's development process, notes, "The parallels between Mosaic's young artists and those who made Motown famous more than forty years ago are stunning. There's the similarity in age, of course. And we also see that same hunger, determination, kinship and immense talent."

Created with in-kind support from the Motown Historical Museum and the University of Michigan Arts of Citizenship Program, the play is based on oral histories shared by Marvelette Katherine Anderson Shaffner and many other Motown pioneers, from performers to sound engineers--all of whom Mosaic's young artists have interviewed personally. This creative approach was employed previously by Mosaic during the development of Hastings Street , the theatre's smash hit from its 2003 season. Like that production, Now That I Can Dance - Motown 1962 promises to be poignant, inspiring and wildly entertaining.

"Something incredible has unfolded before us in Now That I Can Dance ," Sperling beams. "We can't wait to share it with all of metropolitan Detroit. After all, this isn't just Mosaic's story. It's a source of pride and inspiration for the entire city."

Mosaic invites all to join them for song, dance and a dramatic journey through one of Detroit's most thrilling historical eras. The play will run two consecutive weekends, May 13th-15th and May 20th-22nd. Friday and Saturday evening performances begin at 8:00 pm and Sunday matinees begin at 4:00 pm. For ticket information, please contact the DIA box office at [phone] or Lynn Keily at [phone], ext. 4005.

**For More Information Check Mosaic Detroit**

[Motown Honey]

Sounds great...Too bad I'm too far from Detroit :frustration:

[Emerald City]

May 10, 2005

BY MARTIN F. KOHN
FREE PRESS THEATER WRITER

Something felt familiar about the young women whose photo was for sale in the Motown Historical Museum's gift shop. Sure, they were once a famous singing group, but that's not what caught Rick Sperling's attention.
"These were teenagers. They looked just like the kids I was working with," says Sperling, founder and CEO of Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit.

The kids in the photo were the Marvelettes, the Inkster High School students whose 1961 recording of "Please Mr. Postman" became Motown Records' first No. 1 single (on its Tamla label). As Sperling gazed at the photo he
thought about how, from this little building on West Grand that Berry Gordy purchased, Motown had gone on to become an entertainment juggernaut.

"That huge thing started in a house" and, Sperling adds, "I was in a house." He means the former officers' quarters at Historic Fort Wayne that was Mosaic's home when Sperling bought the photo about a decade ago. A
free after-school performing-arts training program for youngsters ages 12 through 18, Mosaic's new home is at University Preparatory Academy, a charter high school in midtown Detroit.

Sperling has kept the Marvelettes' photo on his desk these 10 years, during which time he, his staff and Mosaic's students have created and produced an original musical every year. Some of those shows have been about Detroit's past, to be sure. But not until this weekend's premiere of "Now That I Can Dance --Motown 1962" has Mosaic done a show about the Motown sound.

It wasn't for lack of prodding.

"Everybody had been telling us to do Motown -- and we resisted. Everybody had done it," Sperling says. But the more he thought about it, and the more he thought about the picture on his desk, he began to suspect that
everybody may have been right.

That thinking led to "Now That I Can Dance," which spotlights the Marvelettes and the early days of Motown. Written by Sperling and the Mosaic actors and
incorporating lots and lots of Motown songs, the show is based on firsthand research, including interviews with members of the Marvelettes and their contemporaries.

It's not a documentary, however. "We say we do historical fiction," Sperling says, but it's based on reality. And for a Motown fan like Sperling, meeting some of the performers he admires most has been dreamlike. "There have been several pinch-myself moments," he says.

One such occurred when several young performers spent an hour talking via speakerphone with Marvelettes lead singer Gladys Horton, 61. The conversation was especially important to 17-year-old Redford High School senior Glenda Washington. She's playing Horton in some performances. "It caused me to give her justice. It helped me understand her more, especially regarding the Motortown Revue,"Washington says.

Horton spoke about many of the artists the Marvelettes performed with in those fabled concerts of the early 1960s, debunking a few myths in the process.

[Emerald City]

"No matter what they say, Diana was always nice," Horton said, speaking of Diana Ross. Horton had kind words for the other Supremes, Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson, and she offered an insight about Stevie Wonder's first hit, "Fingertips," a harmonica instrumental (with a bit of singing). " 'Fingertips' was a song derived from disabilities," she said; its title alludes to the way Wonder, blind virtually from birth, was able to read.

"He was just a kid. We were all kids," Horton said.The Supremes, Wonder, Berry Gordy, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, the Contours, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas are all characters in "Now That I Can Dance," and the young performers who play singers get to do many of their famous songs in the authentic style.

Mostly, the show is about the Marvelettes and their meteoric rise from an Inkster High School talent contest -- when they called themselves the Casinyets, shorthand for Can't Sing Yet -- to pop-chart stardom. Katherine Anderson Schaffner, 61, one of the Marvelettes, is the main source for the play, and the group's story proves the stuff of drama, beginning with that talent show.

The top three finishers would win auditions with Motown Records.

The Casinyets came in fourth.

One of their teachers, who thought they should have won, wrangled them an audition at Motown anyhow and drove them there herself.

On the way, they had a flat tire.

Berry Gordy and his associates liked the group's sound but wanted them to come up with original material. One of the girls, Georgia Dobbins, knew a man in Inkster who wrote blues songs. They were inappropriate for high school girls but Dobbins spotted a title in his papers, "Please Mr. Postman."

Sperling says there are "conflicting memories," about how much had been written under the title. What is generally agreed is that Dobbins took whatever was there and in a couple of days had turned it into the song that's known today.

The girls took it to Motown and were offered recording contracts. Because they were minors their parents had to sign.

Dobbins' parents refused. She never recorded with the Marvelettes.

Kierston Daniel, 17, a senior at Detroit Community High School, plays Dobbins in the show and got to meet her at Mosaic's offices. Dobbins, 62, "thought her parents were making the best decision," Daniel says, "But she thinks she would have been the biggest star ever."

Without going into detail, stardom turned out to be a mixed blessing. "Teenagers have to hear this story, how hard it was," Sperling says.

"There's no way I can get everything into this play. It would have to be 'Nicholas Nickleby,' " Sperling says, referring to the famous 8 1/2-hour play. A not-quite-final version of the script suggests "Now That I Can Dance" tells a compelling story.

And it has a lot more Motown music than "Nicholas Nickleby."


'Now That I Can Dance — Motown 1962' Mosaic Youth Theatre

8 p.m. Fri.-Sat.,
4 p.m. Sun.

Student matinee
10:30 a.m. Fri. & May 20

Through May 22

[Emerald City]

All these years and Gladys is still sweet as ever :rockonbaby:

[Motorcity]

At least these yongsters will be exposed to great music, artist and a great person :yayy:

[Emerald City]

Quick update;


FINAL WEEKEND TO SEE MOSAIC'S HIT SHOW ABOUT MOTOWN !

Friends,

This Friday and Saturday at 8pm and Sunday at 4pm are the last shows at the DIA for Mosaic's hit production Now That I Can Dance Motown 1962. The first weekend had audiences laughing, crying, clapping, singing-along, dancing and finally rising to their feet in standing ovation. And the raves are not just coming from the audiences, but from the original Motown artists that are being portrayed as teenagers in 1962. Members of the Marvelettes, Miracles, and Vandellas have proudly proclaimed that this production has vividly captured the energy and drama they experienced in Motown's early days.



I guess todays show may be too late for some, but the last is tomorrow at 4pm

[Motown Honey]

I wish I could see this one :doggone: