Tony-nominated musical coming to PG features local talent

Million Dollar Quartet is coming to the northern capital.

The Tony-nominated musical follows the real-life jam session of all-time greats Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and Carl Perkins. The four artists met on December 4, 1956 at Sun Records through producer Sam Phillips.

If you look closely during the show, you may recognize a face or two.

“The woman playing Dyanne is Ferris Vasko who is an employee here at the theatre and is a great young artist in town. Curtis [Abriel] and Daniel [Bell] are professional musicians in the city, Kenton Klassen is Ben Klassen’s grandson from Homesteader,” explained Director Jack Grinhaus.

“Even some of our designers are originally from Prince George and went off to do big-world stuff and came back to do the show.”

#MillionDollarQuartet depicts the once-in-a-lifetime jam session with some of the biggest voices of the 1950s… Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, & Carl Perkins | #CityOfPG @theatrenwpg @mypgnow pic.twitter.com/EUzyQoJEz9

— Kyle Balzer (@KyleBalzer) November 14, 2018

Grinhaus hopes if people see local talent being portrayed on stage it will help to grow the arts community and keep talent in the north.

“We tend to build some really great technical talent and design talent that we can keep but in terms of the actors, they have to go where the business is,” he said.

“Even Kenton, who is playing Johnny Cash, is living in Vancouver but he came back home for the show. Over time, we’re hoping that we start to groom people who go to theatre school, they train, they get real-world experience, and then they want to come back and hang out with us here.”

Theatre NorthWest will host the show from November 22nd to December 12th.

#MillionDollarQuartet runs Nov22 to Dec12 & Grinhaus says the show is almost sold out; calls this “gathering of the greats” the foundation for modern music | #CityOfPG @theatrenwpg @mypgnow pic.twitter.com/op0q49BKCD

— Kyle Balzer (@KyleBalzer) November 14, 2018