La Jolla Playhouse has released the first production photos of GRIM, its world-premiere musical about the Grim Reaper’s retirement. The run has been extended to Sunday, December 13.
The show plays the Playhouse’s Mandell Weiss Theatre in La Jolla, California. Previews began on October 27, and the theater says the best availability is now from late November.
After 300,000 years of collecting souls, the Grim Reaper is stepping down. His daughter, Diana, needs only to pass one simple test to take over the family business. Then she falls for Josh, a human teenager, and runs into everything else life on Earth involves, the DMV included.
The book is by Joey Orton and Brad Silnutzer, with music and lyrics by Petro AP, Scott Hoying, Orton and Silnutzer. Hoying, who founded the a cappella group Pentatonix, is making his musical theater writing debut. Sammi Cannold directs and Andy Blankenbuehler choreographs.
Akshara Gunda plays Diana, Mateo Lizcano is Josh and Paolo Montalban is Grim. Julio Rey (Mort), Jeremy Davis (Norman), Dana Costello (Tammy) and Jennifer Fouché (Death of Love) lead the rest of the company.
Sets are by Jason Sherwood, costumes by Paloma Young, lighting by Amanda Zieve and sound by Connor Wang. Ted Arthur is music supervisor and music director.
The show runs about 2 hours 30 minutes with an intermission and is recommended for ages 12 and up. Free talkbacks follow the 7:30pm performances on Tuesday, November 10 and Tuesday, November 17. Saturday, November 14 at 2pm is the ASL performance, and open captions are offered that afternoon, on Wednesday, November 25 at 2pm and on Friday, December 4 at 7:30pm. Tickets are available from La Jolla Playhouse.
