WISH-LIST WEDNESDAY: We Aren't Kids Anymore

Official artwork for the 2024 London staged concert

Back to the tangible world of staged musicals this week, and the latest exponent of prolific American musical theatre writer Drew Gasparini. Though perhaps best known as one of the writers for the hit TV series "Smash", he has a plethora of musical theatre projects to his name, one of the latest of which is the one act musical "We Aren't Kids Anymore", which premiered in Newport News, Virginia, and later was performed as a staged concert at the Savoy Theatre in London's west end, with a cast featuring Melanie La Barrie, Jeevan Braich, Aimee Atkinson and Dylan Mulvaney.

The show is a song cycle that embodies the aide of never truly growing up, as well as exploring the idea of pursuing one's dreams, and the rocky road that one takes from conception to achievement of said dream, reminding us that adulthood is rarely a steady path of pre-planned events, rather a random series of blind guesses. And that's ok, nobody knows what life will throw at them, as long as you remember we're all in it together.

The London company of We Aren't Kids Anymore

A full cast album was recorded and released in 2020, with a cast featuring Bonnie Milligan, Nicholas Christopher and Colton Ryan. Though the show has a fairly fragmented timeline, this is fairly common of a song cycle with connecting themes, one harkens back to "35MM" and "Songs for a New World" for similar pieces of theatre. Given the success of the two London concerts, there's no reason we couldn't see a fuly staged production hit a professional stage soon...