There is so much talent on the Colony Theatre stage that it’s a shame they’re not starring in a better show than Nico Juber’s deceptively titled and almost certainly not New York-bound Millennials Are Killing Musicals.

First of all, Millennials is not, as one might logically assume, a show about the supposed ways that Americans between the ages of 23 and 38 (back in 2019 when its story unfolds) are somehow responsible for destroying the most beloved of theatrical genres.

And though considerable mention is made of how Millennials (in cahoots with modern technology) have somehow killed retail, doorbells, snail mail, taxis, alarm clocks, cruises, banks, and more, this just feels like padding.

No, what Millennials Are Killing Musicals is actually about is the lethal effect that social media, in particular Instagram (or “Instacam” as it’s called here), has had in robbing Gen Y-ers of their humanity, case in point single mom Brenda (Emma Hunton), who over the course of the show’s half-hour-too-long running time goes from digitally disconnected to social media obsessed. (An apter title might therefore be Instacam Possession: The Musical)

“Adulting” may not be the easiest thing in the world for Brenda, but at least she’s not posting 24/7 like her social media influencer younger sister Katrina (Diana Huey), eight-months-pregnant and still showing off a nearly perfectly flat mid-section, though if you ask the latter, it’s Brenda who’s missing out by not documenting her life for tens of thousands of followers.

And speaking of perfection, how is it that “Jake’s Mom” (Ainsley Bubbico) seems to get everything right when none of this comes easily to Brenda?

Further complicating matters are Luna (Lana McKissack), Pacifica (Mitchell Gerrard Johnson), and Atlas (John Krause), the show’s Greek Chorus of “Filters,” i.e. singing-and-dancing personifications of digital effects designed to make even the most facially flawed of influencers look as unblemished and glowing as a Kardashian.

Despite initial protestations, it doesn’t take long for Brenda to be seduced into accumulating followers of her own while being torn between two possible love interests, nerdy charmer Dylan (Michael Thomas Grant) and slick-as-a-snake Nate (Krause).

Millennials Are Killing Musicals is at its most engaging when Brenda and Dylan are centerstage because no matter how pervasive online pseudo-connections may be, it’s the real ones that can captivate an audience.

Unfortunately, once the evil Algo (Grant), short for Algorithm, shows up at the end of Act One to “create the problem, sell the solution, and monetize content,” Millennials has so thoroughly jumped the shark that there’s not much anyone on stage can do to get it back on track.

Few of Juber’s songs (she wrote both music and lyrics in addition to the show’s convoluted book) have the kind of melodious hooks that a musical needs to succeed, and considering how rarely shows make it from a regional World Premiere to a Broadway (or off-Broadway) opening night and how few of them find enough of an audience to run more than two or three months, I’d suggest that backers who’ve already put up considerable cash for the Colony run consider investing their funds elsewhere.

On the plus side, having proven her directorial gifts in show after show, Kristin Hanggi does the best she can with the material she’s been given, and the same can be said about ace choreographer Michelle Elkin and music director extraordinaire Anthony Lucca and the show’s topnotch four-piece live orchestra.

At the very least, Millennials Are Killing Musicals gives audiences the chance to discover (or rediscover) the magical and magnetic Hunton, so sympathetic as Brenda and so gorgeous of voice that she captivates us no matter how turned off we may feel by the show she’s starring in, and since leading men don’t get any more irresistible than Grant, scenes between Dylan and Brenda are the show’s most engaging.

Vocal dynamos Huey and Bubbico work their butts off to make Katrina and Jake’s Mom feel more three-dimensional than they do on paper, Jennifer Leigh Warren’s underused Nana Marie gets an eleventh-hour solo seemingly tagged on for no other reason than to give Warren the opportunity to bring down the house (which she does), and though the concept of personified Filters overstays its welcome, triple-threats McKissack, Johnson, and Krause perform with tireless pizzazz (though I did keep wondering if Krause’s Nate was supposed to be Atlas in disguise or a completely different character).

Finally, no expense has been spared to showcase the topnotch design talents of Stephen Gifford (sets), Jessica Champagne Hansen (costumes), John McElveney (properties), Cricket S. Myers (sound), Taylor Edelle Stuart (projections), and Gavan Wyrick (lighting) and at the very least, the show looks and sounds great.

Casting is by Michael Donovan Casting, Michael Donovan, CSA, and Richie Ferris, CSA. Casey Ann Apregan, dance captain Whitney Kathleen Vigil, and Frankie Zabilka are standbys.

Cheryl Daro is associate director. Patricia Squib is technical director. Iliana Solorzano is production stage manager and Sami Hansen is assistant stage manager. Ken Werther is publicist.

The moment I heard that Millennials Are Killing Musicals was coming to the Colony, I put Opening Night on my calendar, intrigued by the idea that folks born a couple of generations after mine were somehow destroying a theatrical genre this Boomer happens to love.

What I ended up getting was a hodgepodge of a musical that’s not without its plusses but is nothing at all like what its title would suggest or anything close to the caliber show I was hoping to see.

Colony Theatre, 555 North Third Street, Burbank.
www.colonytheatre.org

–Steven Stanley
May 2, 2026
Photos: Ashley Erickson

Visit www.theatreinla.com/nowplayingrs.php for a review roundup of what’s now playing in theaters around Los Angeles.

Tags: Colony Theatre, Los Angeles Theater Review, Nico Juber