If you don’t want to miss something special, you’ll be at the Chapman Cultural Center this weekend (March 13-15) for the final 3 performances of Thoroughly Modern Millie. Based on the 1967 Oscar-nominated film of the same name starring Julie Andrews, Mary Tyler Moore and Carol Channing, TMM won the 2002 Tony Award for Best Musical.
We are also proud to be presenting the Upstate premiere of TMM. Not many people know this, but The Spartanburg Little Theatre was the very first non-professional theatre to be granted the rights to perform a Rogers and Hammerstein show (1954’s Carousel), so we do have a long and proud history of Upstate firsts. Not to mention, that the song “Jimmy” from TMM was written by Spartanburg native and Converse College graduate Jay Thompson Jr. (his father was mayor of Spartanburg from 1941-45). Jay Thompson Jr. also co-wrote the little known perennial stage favorite Once Upon a Mattress.
Millie tells the story of Kansas girl Millie Dillmount who moves to New York in 1922 searching for a new life for herself. Determined to join the “Moderns”, Millie bobs her hair and goes in search of a boss she can marry. Along the way she meets Mrs. Meers, proprietor of her boarding hotel and leader of a white slavery ring (with help from her cohorts Bun Foo and Ching Ho—whose lines and songs are entirely in Mandarin Chinese and subtitled!). Add in rich girl gone poor Miss Dorothy, the cheeky Jimmy Smith and the fabulous Muzzy Van Hossmere AND an incomparable group of chorus boys and girls Charlestoning their faces off (you also don’t want to miss the angry tap stomp “Forget About the Boy”), and you have one of the most endearingly ridiculous love stories ever seen on the SLT stage.
Don’t miss Thoroughly Modern Millie March 13 and 14 at 8:00 pm and March 15 at 3:00 pm. Call (864) 542-ARTS or go to www.chapmanculturalcenter.org for tickets. For more information see our website at www.spartanburglittletheatre.org.
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