I love old school musicals from the 40s and 50s and one of my favorites is Annie Get Your Gun. Loaded with great Irving Berlin songs like ‘No Business Like Show Business’ and ‘Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better’ it’s a ton of fun when done well. Being such a big fan when I saw it was being put on by a ‘new to me’ theater called The Hopebox Theatre I had to go give a chance.

The Hopebox is a theater in Kaysville which is about 35 minutes from my house, so a bit of a drive. But the reason why it is called the Hopebox is because they have a charitable mission behind their productions. With each show they raise money for someone in their community who is fighting cancer. Not only are a portion of the proceeds going to help this individual but they have cash boxes for donations in the lobby and accept donations via card at the concessions stand. They also provide a profile of the recipient in the program and they talk about him or her during the intermission and at the closing.

I have never heard of a theater company doing this and I think it is fantastic. It definitely makes the drive out there worth it!

The production is double cast and I saw the Silver or MWF cast (some roles like Sitting Bull are in both casts). This theater is also theater in the round that I love. My only complaint is there was a pole right in front of me blocking my view. I wish in the ordering process they would have let me know and I would have picked a different spot. But oh well. When I saw Frozen the Musical in Denver they did the same thing to me so what are you going to do?

The casting was the real strength of this show. I loved Olivia Casper as Annie and she had great chemistry with Stefan Kurzuis who played Frank. I also enjoyed Gage Humphreys as Tommy Keeler and Evelyn Powers as Winnie Tate. They all did a great job with the songs and the choreography was engaging and made for a fun night of theater.

They did have some microphone problems that could be improved upon. Even with Frank his microphone could have been a little bit louder especially in the “Old Fashioned Wedding” number. He was drowned out by her microphone which hurts the effect of them both singing their melodies with their perspectives of the perfect wedding.

All that said, I really enjoyed this big-hearted production and certainly if you are in the Kaysville area go out and see Annie Get Your Gun. You won’t regret it! And make a donation while you are there to help them in their worthy cause. Great job!

Annie Get Your Gun is playing until the 28th. Tickets can be purchased here.

8 out of 10