Towards the end of A CHORUS LINE, FAU Festival Rep’s final production of the summer, a question is posed about whether musical theater will even survive. It made me smile knowing that this musical written by James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante, with music and lyrics by Marvin Hamlisch and Edward Kleban, not only survived from April 1975 to April 1990 (the first Broadway show to exceed 6,000 performances!), but also won a Tony in 1984 for being Broadway’s Longest-Running Musical. In addition to Tonys for Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score and more, a Pulitzer for Drama and a Best Musical Olivier Award to boot. So it’s hardly surprising that this American classic remains a favorite regional production choice to this day – embraced for its impressive dance numbers, memorable songs, and the raw revelations of its “chorus line” cast.

Well, you know what they say, right? It’s all good fun until a hydrangea loses its roots.  

To introduce the show now playing at Gablestage in its most basic sense: Native Gardens is a play that revolves around a dispute between neighbors over the potential placement of a fence meant to divide their gardens. But before I contemplate the absurdity of finding myself close to tears at the conclusion of a play about a garden dispute, I suppose I should explain that the show’s true subject could perhaps be more accurately described as the joy that can be found when the sense of common humanity overcomes the surface obstacles to understanding. 

NYC-based playwright Stephen Brown is having quite the moment in South Florida. Boca’s Theatre Lab has/will run two of his recent plays and LITTLE MONTGOMERY (formerly known as “Country Girls”) is currently enjoying a Florida premiere by New City Players (NCP) at Island City Stage in Wilton Manors. If the name “Little Montgomery” rings a bell, you might have enjoyed listening to NCP’s highly creative serial podcast version back in 2020, at the height of the pandemic.