Spelling Bee Bookwriter Reteams with Striking 12's GrooveLily on New Work | Playbill

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News Spelling Bee Bookwriter Reteams with Striking 12's GrooveLily on New Work Rachel Sheinkin — bookwriter of the upcoming The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee — will reteam with her Striking 12 collaborators, the pop band GrooveLily, on a new musical.

The librettist told Playbill.com that the group's members — whose live cast album of Striking 12 was just released on the PS Classics label — are working on a new "non-holiday" show.

Striking 12 is a new take on the Hans Christian Andersen story "Little Match Girl." The work was recorded for the album during September 2004 performances at Symphony Space in New York City. The new musical was previously seen at the Philadelphia's Prince Music Theater, San Diego's Old Globe Theatre and Pao Alto's TheatreWorks.

Sheinkin created Striking 12 with Brendan Milburn and Valerie Vigoda and it was performed by the pop band GrooveLily: Vigoda (vocals and electric violin), Milburn (vocals and keyboards) and Gene Lewin (vocals and drums).

Meanwhile, the self-proclaimed "relative latecomer" to the creative team of the new Spelling Bee musical is "under negotiation" with director James Lapine to do some minor changes before the work reaches Broadway.

"I always want to change things and Lapine very sensibly says 'They've got two weeks,'" Sheinkin said at the cast recording for the show. She laughingly adds, "Major restructuring of Act Two may not be possible." The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee begins previews at Broadway's Circle in the Square Theatre April 15 and opens May 2, in time to compete for this year's Tony Awards.

Tony Award-winning Falsettos collaborators — composer-lyricist William Finn and director James Lapine — reteam on the work with Sheinkin, based on a concept by Rebecca Feldman.

The original play C-R-E-P-U-S-C-U-L-E by The Farm, the musical made its world premiere production under the direction of Michael Unger and Feldman at Sheffield, Massachusetts' Barrington Stage Company in July 2004.

For more information, visit www.groovelily.com or www.spellingbeethemusical.com.

 
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