ICT presents the West Coast premiere of a hard boiled, darkly comic rock musical “The Fix”

April 1, 2012 - PRLog -- Just as the 2012 presidential race heats up, International City Theatre (ICT) presents the West Coast premiere of a hard-boiled, darkly comic, Olivier Award-nominated rock musical about the American political machine. U.S. senator and popular presidential candidate Reed Chandler has died in the arms of his mistress. His widow, Violet, determined that “if I can’t be the wife of the president I’ll be his mother,” and her brother-in-law, political king maker Grahame Chandler, thrust her son Cal into the political spotlight. Together, they shepherd Cal through races for city council and the governorship, always with an eye on the final prize – president of the United States. Driven by a powerful rock score, The Fix tells a cynical and darkly comic tale of one of the most dysfunctional almost-first families this side of real life Washington politics.

Originally developed in association with Cameron Mackintosh, The Fix premiered at London’s Donmar Warehouse in 1997 where it was directed by Sam Mendes and received an Olivier nomination for Best Musical. The U.S. premiere took place at the Tony Award®-winning Signature Theatre in Arlington, VA a year later, where it garnered ten Helen Hayes Award nominations.

“It’s funny how the parallels in the script came to pass in so many ways in terms of Clinton, but, it’s also funny to think of it—the dimwitted son in a political dynasty with a substance abuse problem— in terms of Bush,” said John Dempsey in a recent interview with BroadwayWorld. “The inspiration for The Fix came sort of two-fold. We had kicked around this idea of doing Caligula as a rock opera. I was living in Youngstown, Ohio, and there is a very colorful politician up there who was in trouble—he was going to prison or something—so, I started to think, ‘What if you blew it up to national politics and you used the Caligula story?’ And, the idea of a political mother that is that awful is not new, of course - it’s equally inspired, I suppose, by Angela Lansbury in The Manchurian Candidate.”

The Fix runs April 24-May 20; International City Theatre at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center, 300 East Ocean Blvd., Long Beach, CA 90802; $29-$44; (562) 436-4610; www.InternationalCityTheatre.org