Mark David Kaplan

Chicago Sings Broadway’s British Invasion – Porchlight Music Theatre at House of Blues – May 11, 2026

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I’m hard pressed to come up with a logical stream of consciousness regarding this year’s Chicago Sings event, so I will just dive (or diva) into some extremely random thoughts.

I got the chance to have a nice pre-show chat with this year’s Guy Adkins Award recipient, Mark David Kaplan, whom I saw recently as Mr. Mushnik in Little Shop of Horrors. In addition to his talent, what a nice guy, but I’m afraid, a bit of a close talker.

The room wasn’t as cold as last year, but still not shorts weather.

The British Invasion, as with the Revolutionary War, apparently hasn’t been entirely successful for them, at least as far as I’m concerned. I’ve seen less than half the shows that were represented, though only one of them was totally unfamiliar.

One of the shows is coming to Broadway next year – Paddington: The Musical. Seriously?! I think I’ll take a pass, and this is coming from someone who enjoyed SpongeBob SquarePants: The Broadway Musical.

How do you put out a casting call for a singing bear? Well, if I’m reading the West End production website cast list correctly, you find one person to do voice and remote puppetry and someone else to be the on-stage bear.

I lip synched in a show one year and have worn various furry costumes in other shows, but never combined the two disciplines, or, in my case, undisciplined. So kudos to Paddington, but I still won’t see it.

All of Porchlight’s invading performers, including the band, were wonderful, as usual, even though, unlike last year, when there were three, there were no Moes in the group.

One final note – I’m embarrassed to say that I didn’t recognize Aja Alcazar, whom I just saw at Northlight Theatre in the Angel Next Door. But, in fairness to me, she was the angel next door, and the door was usually closed, so I didn’t see that much of her.

Little Shop of Horrors – Marriott Lincolnshire Theatre – March 15, 2026

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The only cast member from the 2018 production of Little Shop of Horrors I saw, who also was in this year’s Marriott version, was Lorenzo Rush, Jr. Given that Lorenzo perfectly gives voice to the person-eating plant Audrey II, I’m guessing that he has a repeating gig for life, at one theater after another, if he wants it, given the everlasting popularity of this fun-loving romp.

Little Shop is in a select group of movies that have become musicals and then movie musicals. I add Hairspray and The Producers to that short, great list (but not Mean Girls, because I would never admit to seeing any version of it, as much as I love Tina Fey).

I would have loved to be in the room when Howard Ashman took a Roger Corman movie and wrote the book and lyrics for a musical version of Little Shop. He, and everyone around him, must have had a great time.

I always wonder how decisions are made regarding character names. The wonderful chorus of Crystal, Ronnette and Chiffon is obvious, but what about Audrey? When Corman picked that name, he couldn’t have known that Ashman would later rhyme it with tawdry in the lyrics of The Meek Shall Inherit. Our good fortune.

And what about Orin Scrivello, D.D.S., played to the hilt, along with several other characters, by Andrew Mueller? My rampant curiosity led me to discover that scrivello is actually a word meaning, according to Merriam-Webster, an elephant’s tusk of a small size commonly used for making billiard balls. Tusk – incisor tooth – dentist – coincidence?

There were other welcome, familiar faces in the cast, for example Jackson Evans, always a treat sharing the stage with a puppet, like the time I saw him in 2014 in Avenue Q. And Mark David Kaplan, set to receive the Guy Adkins Award from Porchlight Music Theatre in May at Chicago Sings Broadway’s British Invasion.