The stories of a Jewish immigrant, a Harlem musician and a wealthy family all set to a Tony Award-winning soundtrack will come to life on stage in a showing of "Ragtime the Musical" on Thursday, Nov. 12 at 7:30 p.m. at The Opelika Center for the Performing Arts.
East Alabama Arts will be hosting the show as part of the production’s national tour.
Philip Preston, director of East Alabama Arts, said the show touches on issues that are still present in today’s society.
“I saw 'Ragtime' on Broadway in the late '90s, and it's quite a powerful show," Preston said. "Very emotional and inspirational, and the issues the show deals with in terms of race relation, income inequality and immigrant status is woven throughout these three concurrent stories and very relevant to a lot of things that our political life is dealing with now."
Preston said he expects people to find the stories uplifting as well as pertinent to society today.
“They are going to take inspiration from these stories themselves and how things turn out with all three of these stories,” Preston said. “There is tragedy involved, but there is triumph as well.”
The show is a musical and Preston said the music does not disappoint.
“It’s serious music, but is also very popular," Preston said. "It evokes the turn of the century America that we know about and is sort of the precursor of jazz. To me the music is the star, and especially the ragtime element of it, because it is so catchy and it just propels the storyline forward.”
Buy tickets here.
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