The stars aligned at the Star Palace last night for Ashley Taylor and, by extension, the strong inaugural performance of the Organic Theater Factory.

For years, the hard-working Taylor has tackled one character role after another on the Fresno community theater scene -- from Mary Sunshine in "Chicago" to Gertrude the Bird in "Seussical" -- as a solid performer. But something special happens in Jason Robert Brown's intimate musical "The Last 5 Years." As Cathy Hiatt, the struggling actress whose story of a disillusioned marriage is told in reverse chronological disorder, Taylor gives a transluscent performance. Her voice is absolutely gorgeous -- there were times when I closed my eyes and thought about how often it matched the level of Sherie Rene Scott's version on the original cast recording.

Just as impressive is the way Taylor mines the emotional territory of her character, never overplaying the sentiment or joking up the giddy moments, always relating on a fiercely human level. She's a wonderful fit for the role, and she gives an already moving play even more of an impact.

My singling Taylor out for special notice isn't in any way meant to slight her partner on stage, Peter Allwine, or the production overall, which has a scrappy, low-key charm. It's just that when it comes to Taylor, it seems this is one of those rare times for an actor when everything truly clicks -- performance, type, spirit -- and it's a beautiful thing to behold.

Bland, bland, bland. "The Wedding Singer" is not the worst show to ever travel through the Saroyan as part of the Best of Broadway series, but it certainly didn't show much sparkle. I saw the Wednesday night performance and was mostly unimpressed with the acting, music and storyline. (The singing and staging were more than adequate, and the dancing had a few stellar moments.) This adaptation of the popular Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore movie crammed in as many '80s references as it could, but it lacked the film's quirky, offbeat charm. The main characters, Robbie Hart (J. Michael Zygo) and Julia Sullivan (Jillian Zygo), who are husband and wife in real life, had some moments of sweetness, but there was little comic chemistry.

There's only one character who breaks through: that of Linda (Jennifer Gottlieb), the over-the-top fiancee who dumps the wedding-singer main character, Robbie. Stomping out in a Madonna-bustier-inspired wedding dress get-up, she delivers her "A Note From Linda" with a husky, grunting, full-of-herself, vocal-onslaught acerbity-- all the while offering satirical shades of the Material Girl. Later in the (admittedly better) second act, Linda shows up again, this time to steal the show once again with her over-the-top, acrobatic sexuality. If the creative team had figured out a way to extend Linda's appeal to the rest of the show, this could have been a raucous trip back to an earlier decade. Instead, it just sort of fades into the dustbin of Broadway history.

First off, here are our two winners for the "All in the Timing" ticket giveaway for this weekend: Amy Hance and Kelly Hawthorne. Each wins two tickets. Congrats.

I talked with some of the show's creative team last week and wanted to share some of their answers to give a little more background for people not familiar with the show:

Question: For people who aren't familiar with the Rogue "All in the Timing" productions, fill them in. Are you now presenting the full David Ives script?

Answer: "All In The Timing" is a collection of hilarious short comedies by David Ives, and we are presenting an evening (or afternoon) of our favorites. Think of it as sketch comedy a la "Saturday Night Live", but with an irreverent appreciation of relationships, language, and philosophy rather than politics and pop culture. There are 14 plays in the complete collection, and presenting them all would be too long for a single evening. We selected 8, including 4 we performed at Rogue Festival 2008 and 3 we did at Rogue 2009, plus 1 that is entirely new for us. Each play has humor on all levels as well as light but poignant commentary on the human condition.

In Friday's 7 section I have an interview with Lisa Taber, director of the new Theatre Ventoux production of "12 Angry Men," which opens 8 p.m. tonight at the Cal Arts Blackstone Theatre. Here's the full interview:

Question: Why "12 Angry Men"?

Answer: We [Theatre Ventoux co-founders Greg and Lisa Taber] ran into Jim Tuck on New Year's Eve and were talking theater. He mentioned "12 Angry Men" as a show he'd love to do, along with a number of actors, and wished someone in town would stage it. Greg and I thought it was a great idea, ran with it, and 11 months later, here we are. Also, we thought doing this play would be a nice counterpoint to "The Anastasia Trials in the Court of Women," which featured an all-female cast.

Did you go to "Michael Flatley's Lord of the Dance" last night at the Saroyan? One reader writes:

I just came from watching most of "Lord of the Dance." I say most because I couldn't stand to stay for the entire performance. The dancing was expectedly good, but that's it. There was no live band, no narrator, no free program and the costumes were horrific. During one scene the girls wore 2-piece neon spandex costumes, and during another dance tore off their dresses as if they were strippers! They used way too much make-up (bright red lipstick) and Dolly Parton wigs while acting like temptresses on stage. The red sparkling outfits with slits up the sides...excuse me, no self-respecting Irish girl would dress like that. It was a glittsey Americanized version of what used to be a cultural standard. Thumbs down.

Anyone care to rebut that view?

A "new" play by Mark Twain is an event no matter the century. That "Is He Dead?" took so long to finally come to theatrical life -- it opened on Broadway in 2007 and reached Fresno this weekend in the form of a Good Company Players production through Aug. 9 at the 2nd Space Theatre -- might be considered by some as an ominous sign. How good could it be if it sat on a shelf all these years?

I prefer to think, however, that Twain's silly offering was just waiting for a good script doctor and a talented cast. And that's what it got from playwright David Ives, credited with adapting the script, who I'm guessing did a lot to add much of the airy lift to this comic souffle by getting us past Twain's musty set-up, and the GCP comedy team. If cornball jokes about Impressionism and "oui-oui" French humor tickles your funny bone, there's a lot to laugh at (or at least groan at) in this wacky production. Sure, Twain is no Oscar Wilde, and at times the play comes across as more generic than inspired -- complete with the actors making eye-rolling asides at the audience -- but the brisk performances save the night.

Peter Allwine does the cross-dressing honors as the impoverished (and today quite famous) painter Jean-Francois Millet, whom Twain never met. The hapless Millet, who leads a merry band of bohemian friends in happy pursuit of the starving-artist lifestyle, is unable to sell any of the gorgeous paintings he makes of French peasants. To add insult to his garret woes, a slimy art dealer, Bastien (plumbed to infectious comic depths by a wonderfully arch Patrick Allan Tromborg), plans to foreclose not only on him but also his girlfriend's father.

UPDATE 10 p.m. Wednesday: I was the third of the four spellers to be kicked off! I even did a little dancing in front of 1,500 people, and the roof of the Saroyan didn't cave in.

Here's the word I missed, Heather: "abulia." It's a psychiatric term. I spelled it "ebulia."

It was a great show, by the way. Some of the best singing I've heard in a national tour coming through the Saroyan.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Tonight's the night: I take the stage as the celebrity speller in the national touring production of "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" at the Saroyan Theatre. Here's my goal: to not be the first of the four audience volunteers booted off stage. Then again, if I make it past that point, I'm going to have to dance, and that's a scary thought in itself. (Not so much for me as the audience.)

The one thing I know is that there's no chance I can win. Not even national spelling bee champs have made it into this intermissionless musical's second half -- it's not written that way. (Weird bit of trivia: When Julie Andrews was the celebrity speller, she missed on "supercalifragilisticexpealadoucious.") It kind of takes the pressure off when I know I'm destined to lose!

"New Wrinkles" is looking and feeling quite svelte these days. Could we go so far as to say it's shed a few pounds? There's a trim, fit flair to this year's annual senior variety show at Fresno City College.

A big reason for that, I suspect, is that director Fred Bologna made sure that the show clocks in at a reasonable length. Last year's production was, um, a little on the bloated side. An audience member shouldn't feel as if he or she has actually moved closer to retirement during a production.

For this year's event, titled "Love and Marriage: For Better ... For Worse," Bologna cut more than dozen numbers just days before opening. I know that those cuts must have been painful to performers who lost prized solos. There should be some consolation, though, knowing that a streamlined show is better for everyone around. It still isn't brief, mind you -- the opening night performance ran about two and a half hours -- but the show never drags.

Christian Busath absolutely knew it for certain when he saw "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" for the first time.

"I told myself I had to be in this show, and I have to be William Barfee," he told me in a phone interview. (He grew up in the Elk Grove area, where he was spending a two-week break.) Busath finally got his big theatrical break when he was cast in the national touring production of the musical.

I write about "Spelling Bee" -- and my stint as a guest "celebrity speller" at the Wednesday evening performance at the Saroyan Theatre -- in my column in Sunday's Spotlight section. Here's some more of my interview with Busath:

Question: What connection do you feel with your character?

Answer: When I was his age, I was definitely the short, overweight awkward kid trying to fit in. For William, spelling is the way he fits in. For me, the way I fit in was theater. I used comedy to gain acceptance.

In Friday's 7 section I have a condensed interview with Dede Nibler, music director of the senior show "New Wrinkles," which opens Friday at Fresno City College. Here's the entire interview:

Question: As music director and vocal coach, what have these past weeks been like for you?

Answer: I am available to the cast for special vocal sessions which, I hope, give them confidence and polish. I also work with the large and small choruses at the start of every rehearsal. Beyond that, I am part of the New Wrinkles Band - I play the bass part on many of the songs.

How many years have you been involved in "New Wrinkles"?

Director Fred Bologna and I started together in 2004 - this is our 6th season.

How does the show come together? Do people submit acts or routines? When did that process start?

The show began with the theme announcement, which is done at the show evaluation and cast party in June, the day after our last performance. By the end of August, individuals had responded to a query for acts, songs, dance routines, etc. Fred and I met more than several times to study the submitted acts and place them in a tentative order. We organized the show to fit the submissions. Participants received a letter telling them of their act in the show in October. Chorus music and learning CDs were handed out at a chorus rehearsal the end of October.

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Pictured: Dede Nibler, left, Geno Ventura and Cynthia Dallas appear in "New Wrinkles." (Bee photo by Craig Kohlruss)

I like "The Wiz." I don't think it's the most polished show of the past year from Good Company because of some weaknesses in vocals and choreography, but this nicely directed production has a heart big enough to be divided amongst an army of appreciative Tin Men. The show has a warm, goofy sensibility that meshes nicely with the 1970s-tripped-out setting of this "Wizard of Oz" adaptation. I've seen shows set in the '70s that felt more like museum pieces than anything else -- look at those weird clothes people used to wear! -- but this "Wiz" doesn't gawk. It gently celebrates the flash and sparkle of an era.

When the original musical opened in the 1970s, it was one of the first shows on Broadway to feature an all-black cast. More folks today are probably familiar with the 1978 movie, in which an obviously too-old Diana Ross snagged the leading role of Dorothy, than the stage musical.

In terms of ethnicity, director Dan Pessano has opted for a more widely diverse approach to casting, and the impact is wonderful. Many of the leading roles are played by black actors, as it should be, but the overall impact is decidedly rainbow. It's a nice, bright, inclusive feeling.

Mike Oz gave you some great options, and I fall to my knees on a towel and praise the heavens that none of his picks involve 1) parolees; 2) hats; or 3) transmission of the H1N1 virus. Here are a few more weekend suggestions from the arts/culture side of the aisle:

LISTEN TO OPERA IN A MAGNIFICENT CHURCH: The Fresno Grand Opera's annual "Opera on Van Ness" concert features "opera's biggest hits along with the greatest of classical melodies sung by the Fresno Grand Opera Chorus and Soloists." 5 p.m. Sunday, First Congregational Church, 2131 N. Van Ness Blvd. There's a pre-performance Silent auction and reception at 4 p.m. presented in association with the church.

Here's the easy-to-remember version: I don't much care for "The Fantasticks."

Before I watched the Actors' Repertory Theatre stage production at the Severance Theatre, the only version I'd seen of the world's longest running musical -- it opened in New York only slightly after the dinosaurs died, finally closing in 2002 before reopening in yet another run that continues to this day -- was a slick 1995 film version starring Joel Grey on DVD. I'd been decidedly ho-hum about that experience, and I can say the same thing after watching the admittedly competent and assured production that the ART folks have put together.

To me, "The Fantasticks" (playing through April 19) is a show that has one amazing blockbuster song ("Try to Remember," as reliable as onions in the tear-provoking department) and a lot of bluster. Its small-scale charm and simplicity wear well for 20 minutes or so, then grow stale. Many of the songs themselves come across as tinny and tuneless. My suspicion is that the show became famous for running a long time not because it's such an exceptional evening of theater but that it, well, managed to run a long time. In other words, a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Those stout defenders of "traditional values" who rail on about today's decadent entertainments and pine for the good old days obviously didn't spend much time in mythology class. The ancient Greeks were pretty twisted, at least in their stories. Daughters lusting after fathers, mothers twisting off their son's heads, stuck-up mortals being transformed into spiders and trees by jealous gods -- many of these ancient tales throb with sex, violence and the ever-present threat of years of psychotherapy. (It's no wonder that Freud loved affixing Greek names to his various complexes.) You've never quite tasted revenge until it's been served up to you in the form of your son as stew of the day.

Ruth Griffin, who directs the highly effective "Tales from Ovid" (continuing through Saturday at Fresno State's Woods Theatre), a translation of free verse by Ted Hughes, has a keen tactile sense of the inherent dysfunction of the material. She also finds a sense of human redemption within its often bizarre parameters, which is just as important.

Griffin teaches dance and physical theater at the university, and every fiber of this production pulses with movement. This title was a great pick for Griffin. By bringing together both dancers and actors from Fresno State -- and freely interchanging their duties -- she's managed to craft a show that, while not always perfect, has its own powerful rhythm. An added bonus is a moody and atmospheric original score by Fresno State music professor Brad Hufft.

[Photo: "Narcissus and Echo" by Jon Bock, part of the art exhibition in the Lyles Gallery in conjunction with the show.]

Jeff White is all over the theater news this week. Not only is he directing the new Artists' Repertory Theatre production of "The Fantasticks," which opens Friday, but he's also been named the new artistic director of Children's Musical Theaterworks. According to the company:

White will oversee all productions in the Children's Musical Theaterworks and Musical Theaterworks Fresno 2009 season lending his talents in set design, costuming, props and overall production quality. While also will be starting a series of performance arts classes that will run year round starting with a Spring Break theater camp this April.

He most recently worked with the company directing and set designing the winter 2008 production of "Peter Pan."

On the jump: This weekend's openings include Roosevelt High School of the Arts getting zany with "Epic Proportions" and Fresno State getting Greek on us with "Tales from Ovid." Plus: Playhouse Merced puts in a pitch for "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe."

GOOD TENTATCLE DAY: Devoted Fresno followers of Heidi Blickenstaff -- the Good Company Players alum whose Broadway career is really revving up these days -- have a lot to keep track of. After her starring performance in "[title of show,]" the spunky little musical that made it all the way to Broadway, she returned to the powerhouse show "The Little Mermaid" for a limited run. In her first engagement with "Mermaid," she understudied the major role of Ursula the Sea Witch. Now she's back nightly as a replacement for Ursula through April 5. She dropped me an email recently from New York and wrote about the character:

She's a pastiche of Madeline Kahn, Patti Lupone, Shirley Temple, Hannibal Lecter, Mae West, Bette, Judy, Cher... I could go on and on. She's so schizo... I love her. She is delicious... I'm learning so much. I feel so lucky to have had [title of show] and Mermaid back to back like this. They are opposites in almost every way, and yet both are so exciting and fulfilling.

Broadway.com did a very fun slideshow feature documenting the grueling process that Heidi undergoes each night to transform into Ursula. And she talked last week in Playbill.com's well-known "Diva Talk" column about what it's like to shift from understudy to starring role -- and what the future holds for her. It's a delightful interview, so check it out.

On the jump: "Little Women" all set for a Thursday opening at Roger Rocka's, a fond farewell to "Footloose," the Reedley River City Players gear up for "Show Offs," and an 85-year-old actor threatens to steal the show in the upcoming Lindsay Community Theater production of "Damn Yankees."

The Fresno community theater scene doesn't often get a dose of "big name" syndrome -- the marquee fever that occurs when a well-known actor adds excitement to a cast. (In New York, it seems these days that nearly every Broadway show tries to snag a TV or film star to boost attendance.) For me, at least, that was my feeling opening night at "The Man Who Came to Dinner," directed by Nancy Miller, at the 2nd Space Theatre.

The man of the hour is Brad Myers, longtime Fresno State theater prof, accomplished director and a professional actor who has done most of his acting gigs outside the area. Now, courtesy of Actors' Equity Assocation, to which Myers belongs, the audience gets to experience his wry, commanding stage presence in this Good Company Players production. Supported by a large and well-directed ensemble cast, Myers helps make this classic Moss Hart/George S. Kaufman comedy -- which has some interesting things to say about fame and celebrity -- a pleasant theatrical diversion.