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Weekend spotlight: Unwrapping the last of the holiday shows
Broadway on the Bay is a company formed by husband-and-wife singer/actor/dancers Scott Difford and Heather Tepe, who relocated here from New York in 2021.
Both have been in the cast and/or ensemble of numerous big Broadway shows (check it out: Tepe made her Great White Way debut at age 10, playing “Baby June” in the Bernadette Peters-starring revival production of Gypsy. There were many after that; her touring and regional theater credits are a mile long).
Difford was 13 when he toured the country in Ragtime; his multiple Broadway credits include The Book of Mormon.
They’re serious talents with serious chops, and Friday (4 and 8 p.m.) they’ll be onstage at the Mahaffey Theater, along with a select handful of their similarly-talented young friends, for a family-friendly musical revue called A Very Broadway Christmas. It’s the group’s second annual holiday production.
“We’re pretty much one or two degrees of separation from anyone who’s been on Broadway in the last 20 years,” Difford told the Catalyst in 2023. “That’s part of this this business model: We can get in touch with anybody we want to get in contact with, and see if they’re interested. So that’s what we did.”
Along with Difford and Tepe, this particular Broadway on the Bay ensemble includes Kate Rockwell (Mean Girls, Bring it On, Rock of Ages, Hair, Legally Blonde), Felicia Boswell (Motown, Memphis, Shuffle Along), Geoff Packard (Phantom of the Opera, Bandstand, Rock of Ages, Matilda), Chelsea Packard (Wicked, Beautiful, Promises Promises, Hands on a Hardbody), Justin Gomlak Greer (Annie, Shrek, The Producers, Annie Get Your Gun, Seussical, Urban Cowboy, Anything Goes, The Mystery of Edwin Drood).
Young Tampa singer Pranysqa Mishra (a semifinalist on America’s Got Talent) will also perform, as will the Pinellas County Center for the Arts Vox Nova Chamber Choir.
The 26-song Christmas show includes a live, five-piece band.
In that 2023 interview, Tepe explained the rationale for putting in the work in St. Pete. “We saw the Mahaffey and we were confused as to why there was no big theater happening there. So we decided to do the other side of what we like to do – start directing, and choreographing and creating a theater company. Rather than just performing.”
Click here for A Very Broadway Christmas tickets.
Holiday Pops concerts
The other big weekend draw is Holiday Pops, the annual be-of-good-cheer concert from The Florida Orchestra. With Chelsea Gallo conducting, the gang will play a full program of carols and fun tunes for Yuletide, everything from Broadway’s “We Need a Little Christmas” to “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” movie music from The Nightmare Before Christmas and The Polar Express … and the Master Chorale of Tampa Bay on board for Handel’s Messiah.
Here’s the schedule: Friday 8 p.m., Straz Center Ferguson Hall (sold out); Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m., Mahaffey Theater; Sunday, 2 and 7:30 p.m., Ruth Eckerd Hall.
All Holiday Pops tickets are here.
Holiday stage shows
In Stageworks’ “Great American Trailer Park Christmas Musical”: Julia Rifino, left, and Ashley Janel Whiting. Image: Stage Photography of Tampa.
Since the big day is coming on the 25th (next Wednesday), bay area theater companies are shutting down for the holiday break after this weekend. Here’s what’s on the schedule:
The Great American Trailer Park Christmas Musical at Stageworks (Tampa): Friday’s show is sold out, but tickets are here for 3 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, and 3 p.m. Sunday.
Who’s Holiday at the Off-Central (St. Petersburg) turned out to be the surprise hit of the season, and all remaining performances (tonight through Sunday) are sold out.
It’s a Wonderful Life – A Live Radio Play, produced by the Tampa Repertory Theatre in the Straz Center Shimberg Playhouse (Tampa) has shows at 7:30 p.m. today and Friday, 3 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, and 3 p.m. Sunday. There’s one final performance Monday at 7:30 p.m. Tickets.
Wonderful Life at American Stage (St. Petersburg) is a one-person adaptation of It’s a Wonderful Life, with actor Gavin Hawk. At 7 p.m. today, 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 2 p.m. Sunday. Tickets.
A Christmas Carol in Concert at freeFall (St. Petersburg) is presented at 7 p.m. Friday, 2 and 7 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday – and 2 p.m. Tuesday (Christmas Eve!). Tickets are here.
A Christmas Carol – the full play – is onstage Monday, via a national tour, at Ruth Eckerd Hall. Tickets for the 7 p.m. performance are here.
Sunday at the Capitol Theatre: Christmas with the Celtic Angels. Publicity photo.
Still more concerts
Jazz saxophonist Mindi Abair brings her annual Christmas tour to the Capitol Theatre Friday. Abair is a native of St. Petersburg, and tells her incredible story on Friday’s edition of our Arts Alive! podcast. Find tickets for her Capitol Theatre concert here.
The Canadian touring ensemble Classic Albums Live re-creates Pink Floyd’s 1980 opus The Wall in its entirety Friday at the Baycare Sound, accompanied by The Florida Rock Symphony, a hand-picked coterie of 30 to 40 professional players. Tickets.
Jai Shanae of The Studio@620’s SOULstice – A Holiday Cabaret. Facebook photo.
Starting tonight at The Studio@620: SOULstice: A Holiday Cabaret, a “soulful singalong” with a three-piece band and singers Katrina Young, DJ Schuett, Adrien De La Rosa, Kristen Brazzel and Jai Shanae. Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. today, Friday and Saturday, and 3 p.m. Sunday. Find tickets here.
Friday at Largo’s Central Park Performing Arts Center: The all-Irish singing and dancing Christmas With the Celts (a long-time PBS favorite). Tickets.
A cappella singing group Rockapella returns with the annual Rockapella Christmas show Saturday at the Capitol Theatre. Tickets are here.
Another a cappella group – Nashville’s Home Free – delivers a holiday show Saturday at the Tampa Theatre. Tickets.
It’s not a concert, but more of an extravaganza. Saturday at Ruth Eckerd Hall: Colorful Christmas stage fantasies, aerobatic thrills and circus feats – it’s Cirque Musica Holiday Wonderland. Tickets for the 7 p.m. performance are here.
The five singing ladies known as Celtic Angels are at the Capitol Theatre Sunday; with an Irish band, step dancers and tons of holiday music and mirth-making. At 7 p.m.; tickets are here.
Your Weekend Spotlight appears every Thursday in the Catalyst’s CREATE section.
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