Entertainment Weekly’s 2nd-Best Christmas Movie of All Time* comes to irresistible song-and-dance life at the Ahmanson as Center Theatre Group treats audiences of all ages to Broadway’s A Christmas Story: The Musical.

Like the 1983 cinematic perennial on which it’s based, the 2012 Best Musical Tony nominee introduces us to characters created decades earlier by humorist Jean Shepherd in his 1966 novel In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash.

There’s preteen Ralphie (Kai Edgar), his eyes almost as wide with Christmas cheer as his glasses are huge, and Ralphie’s kid brother Randy (Henry Witcher), bundled up against the winter chill like nobody’s business.

Also around are Ralphie’s best besties Schwartz (Kayden Alexander Koshelev) and Flick (Jack Casey), the latter of whose tongue has an unfortunate triple-dog-dare-you encounter with a frozen flagpole; and the bullies who make their life a living heck (Jordan Coates and Zeke Bernier as Scut Farkus and Grover Dill).

At home, The Old Man (Eric Andersen) still rages about the family furnace, battles neighborhood hounds, and exults when informed he’s won “A Major Award” while Mother (Sabrina Sloan) does her best to support her irascible spouse, give her boys maternal love and guidance, and get Randy to eat his meatloaf, even if it means doing it piggy-style.

At school, Miss Shields (Shelley Regner) still does her best to control her rambunctious pupils, believes that “guilt is far worse than any punishment” she might dole out (as if), and insists on proper margins in the “themes” she assigns.

Joseph Robinette’s Tony-nominated book manages to include virtually every one of the bits that have made the movie a Christmas tradition while leaving room for 2017 Oscar winners Benj Pasek and Justin Paul’s clever, catchy score, songs that nabbed the duo their first Tony nomination before Dear Evan Hansen did the trick.

Following in the footsteps of original Broadway director John Rando, director Matt Lenz pays tribute to the movie original while allowing his cast the freedom to put their own stamps on beloved characters; Warren Carlyle’s high-kicking, tap-tap-tapping choreography (recreated here by Brooke Martino) is the very definition of inspired; and the show’s production design (based on the Broadway original) is a nostalgic, Technicolor wonder.

Most importantly for Los Angeles theater enthusiasts, casts don’t get any better than the L.A.-based talents assembled on the Ahmanson stage.

Kai proves a nonstop delight as the irrepressible Ralphie while revealing pipes to reach the back row of balcony and beyond, Witcher steals every scene he’s in as everybody’s favorite kid brother Randy, and you won’t find a more adorable, charismatic, multitalented children’s ensemble than Bernier, Addalie Burns (Esther Jane), Casey, Coates, Greta Rebecca Kleinman (Nancy), Koshelev, Emilie Ong (Carol), Jacob Pham, Izzy Pike (Mary Beth), and Stover, each and every one of whom gives the grownups stiff competition in the triple-threat department.

Petersen takes the role made indelible on screen by Darren McGavin and harrumphs and blusters The Old Man with exuberant, infectious glee; Sloan imbues Mother with abundant maternal patience and affection while singing the touching “What A Mother Does” with the voice of an angel; Regner’s Miss Shields combines authority, sass, and the tappingest feet in town in the showstopping “You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out”; and Carsten’s Jean Shepherd narrates Ralphie’s tale with wit and warmth.

Adult ensemble members may play second fiddle to the kids this time round, but there are no more gifted singer-dancer-actors than Gabbie Fried, Andrew Ge, Juliane Godfrey, Julia Harnett, Michael James, Trent Mills, Kyle Montgomery, and Gabriel Navarro as everything from bank robbers to firefighters to police officers to doctors and nurses to elves, with special snaps to Montgomery’s eternally sloshed Santa and Ge’s snappy Chinese Waiter, no longer the racial stereotype he was in the movie.

And just wait till virtually the entire cast get together to do Busby Berkeley proud in the 1930s-style extravaganza that is “A Major Award” or to sing and dance up a storm in the kid’s fantasy that is “Ralphie To The Rescue.”

Last but not least, I absolutely guarantee you will jump for joy when two of the most talented pooches in town show up as a couple of the neighboring Bumpus family’s “smelly hound dogs,” trained to canine award-worthy perfection by William Berloni.

Musical director/musical supervisor Andrew Smithson conducts a Broadway-caliber thirteen-piece orchestra, with vocals and instrumentals expertly mixed by sound designer Brian Hsieh.

Casting is by Alison Franck, CSA. Steven-Adam Agdeppa, dance captain Jane Papageorge, and Jacob Pham are swings. Jill Gold is production stage manager.

Like White Christmas, Holiday Inn, and Elf before it, A Christmas Story: The Musical takes a seasonal Hollywood favorite and transforms it into the most exhilarating of song-and-dance joy rides. That pretty much everyone in the audience is likely to be experiencing A Christmas Story Live On Stage for the very first time is icing on an already scrumptious theatrical Christmas cake

*2nd only to It’s A Wonderful Life

Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N Grand Ave, Los Angeles. Through December 31.
www.CenterTheatreGroup.org

–Steven Stanley
December 8, 2023
Photos: Craig Schwartz Photography

Tags: Ahmanson Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Jean Shepherd, Joseph Robinette, Los Angeles Theater Review, Pasek & Paul