Chance Theater opens their 27th season with a gorgeously staged and performed production of the 2012 Broadway smash Once, easily one of the most charming and heartstrings-tugging musicals of the past 27 years.

 The tale of a Dublin street musician (a Guy still pining for his split-for-NYC ex) and a Czech immigrant (a Girl with an out-of-country husband and in-country child) and their whirlwind weekend of songwriting and love, Once chalked up eight Tony wins (including Best Musical), and not just because of its Irish boy-meets-Czech girl love story.

 Like the 2007 John Carney-written-and-directed movie smash on which it is based, Enda Walsh’s charmer of a book has busker “Guy” meeting immigrant “Girl” over a broken vacuum cleaner, then embarking on the dual adventures of recording a CD of his songs and falling hopelessly in love.

Also imported from the film is the catchiest Irish Indie Pop score ever heard on a Broadway stage, songs by film’s stars Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová that take us from the aching-hearted “Leave” and “The Hill” to the glorious full-cast harmonies of “Gold” and “When Your Mind’s Made Up.”

Unlike its cinematic source, however, Once The Musical has its entire cast, including Chance Theater stars Morgan Hollingsworth as Guy and Emma Laird as Girl in both performer and musician mode, accompanying themselves and each other on accordion, bass, cajon, cello, drums, guitar, mandolin, percussion, piano, ukulele, and violin.

Hardly a new concept for a Broadway show (director John Doyle did the same with this actors=musicians revivals of Sweeney Todd and Company) but one that works even better in Once, if only because Guy & Girl’s story is as much about making music as it is about making love.

It makes perfectly delightful sense for Guy’s repair-shop-owner father and the studio engineer they approach about making Guy’s demo and the bank manager they go to for a loan and the pub regulars they enlist as musicians to be part of Once’s eight-piece orchestra (ten if you count Guy on guitar and Girl on piano).

And if this approach worked wonders on Broadway, on tour, and in regional productions these past fourteen years, it’s particularly suited to Chance Theater, where the performers-as-musicians concept turned this past summer’s Spring Awakening into something even more innovative than the Broadway original.

It helps enormously to have James Michael McHale on hand to direct, and not only because of his inspired work staging American Idiot and the recent Scrooge but because having himself performed in more than one production of Once, he knows the show backwards and forwards and is able to bring his own masterful ingenuity to the mix, and some terrific choreographic skills as well.

Scenic designer Bradley Kaye’s set suggests both Dublin exteriors and interiors (and the city’s skyline as well), making it well suited to transport us from city streets to a vacuum cleaner repair shop to a bank manager’s office to a makeshift recording studio to the hills about the city and proves an ingenious substitute for the Broadway original’s Dublin pub set.

 Not only that but lighting designer Jacqueline Malenke, projection designer Nick Santiago and costume designer Sara Egger up the visual magic every step of the way as the most multitalented cast in town deliver one sensational performance after another beginning with Hollingsworth’s and Laird’s matching star turns as Once’s star-crossed Guy and Girl.

Hollingsworth gives Guy abundant boy-next-door charm with powerhouse vocals to match, Laird is simply exquisite as Once’s sweet and spunky Girl, and together the twosome ignite enough romantic sparks to light up the Dublin sky.

Most scene-stealing of all in Once’s scene-stealing featured cast are Will Huse as the larger-than-life, social-skills-deprived music shop owner Billy and Chance newcomer Austin Ledger as the wild-and-crazy, pants-doffing Svec.

Leota Rhodes doubles memorably as the earthy, life-loving Reza and Guy’s still-pining Ex-Girlfiend, Jennifer Richardson is a delight as Girl’s slightly odd but endlessly caring mother Barushka, and Mike Bradecich is an endearing charmer as a Bank Manager with a penchant for the penis.

 Lex Leigh steps beyond his role as Once’s music director to bring Guy’s deeply-feeling Da to vibrant life, Jonah Meyer makes for an irresistibly dorky Andrej, and Joseph Dailey is equally fine as music store manager Eamon and the amiable Emcee at the Dublin nightclub where Guy performs.

Adorable child actress Amy Sorensen (alternating with Becca Last) makes a pair of brief appearances as Girl’s daughter Ivanka.

James Markoski completes Once’s dream team with his pitch-perfect sound design and engineering.

Aaron Lipp is assistant director. Kylie Baumbusch is associate scenic designer. Sophie Hall Cripe is dramaturg. Glenda Morgan Brown is dialect coach.

Cynthia C. Espinoza is stage manager and Loren Morris is assistant stage manager. Casting is by Lindsay Brooks.

Whether or not Guy and Girl’s future lies with each other or apart (and I’ll leave it to you to find out which destiny awaits them), audiences in need of escape could do no better than to head over to the Chance for Once, a musical so magical and memorable, you might even want to see it twice.

Chance Theater, 5522 E. La Palma Ave., Anaheim Hills.
www.chancetheater.com

–Steven Stanley
January 31, 2026
Photos: Doug Catiller

Tags: Chance Theater, Enda Walsh, Glen Hansard, John Carney, Markéta Irglová, Orange County Theater Review