Theater review: ‘School of Rock’ rocks Grapevine with young cast

The folks behind School of Rock, the Musical, based on the 2003 movie, made a smart marketing choice: to open up the licensing rights simultaneously with the Broadway show.

That never happens with new musicals; regional theaters usually have to wait until after the show closes on Broadway — or longer, if it’s still in national tours. This is why you didn’t see local productions of Les Miserables until a few years ago, even though it opened on Broadway in the 1980s. (And don’t expect to see locally produced versions of hits like Wicked or Hamilton anytime soon.)

The caveat with School of Rock is that only high schools and youth theaters, using performers younger than 18, can license it. Locally, Grapevine’s Ohlook Performing Arts Center was the first group granted rights. Of the more than 50 productions scheduled across the country, there are a few more coming in DFW high schools in the fall.

This tactic is smart on a couple of levels. Because a large part of the cast is the fifth-grade class that learns to embrace individuality thanks to rock musician/substitute teacher Dewey, it’s a great choice for youth theaters.

Secondly, what better way to get youth excited in a new musical than to give them a chance to see and/or perform in it amid the Broadway buzz? (Reviews for the Broadway production, which opened in December, have been mostly enthusiastic.)

The 2003 movie, directed by Texan Richard Linklater with a screenplay by Mike White, made a star of Jack Black as Dewey, a down-on-his-luck rock guitarist who is booted by his band, and possibly by friend Ned and his wife, Patty, if Dewey can’t pay his part of the rent.

Dewey scams his way into a substitute-teaching job, where he has to fill in for a fifth-grade class for the remainder of the semester. The problem? The only skill he has is shredding on the guitar. Well, that and being impossibly likeable.

The score is by Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, who helped define the genre of rock musical with his Jesus Christ Superstar, with lyrics by Glenn Slater and a book by Julian Fellowes of Downton Abbey fame.

As you might expect, it’s filled with rock ’n’ roll references, with mentions of Jimi Hendrix, Lou Reed, Queen, Mama Cass, Stevie Nicks and Les Claypool of Primus, among others, and musical tributes to the Stones’ (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction and Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water.

There’s even a hilarious rib at the musical Cats, funny because of the Lloyd Webber connection and the fact that on Broadway, School of Rock is housed in the Winter Garden Theatre, Cats’ house for 18 years. (That dig is in the movie, too, but kudos to this team for keeping it.)

Ohlook hasn’t shied away from loud rock musicals in its tiny Grapevine strip-mall space, and here, they crank it up to 11. It’s directed by Jill Blalock Lord, with an offstage band of Jesse Fry on keyboards, Nathan McCord on drums and Matt Mitchell on guitar.

The space continues to have sound balance issues, though, and because this is youth theater, that means the adults are played by teenagers, with wildly mixed results (not to mention a few bad wigs and mustaches).

But what it has going for it is Drew Mitchell, a freshman at Collin College and nominee of a Dallas Summer Musicals High School Musical Theatre Awards best actor prize (as Sweeney Todd), as Dewey. He’s everything this character needs: a self-effacing screw-up, but passionate, engaging and quick-thinking with charisma to burn. As Rosalie, the school principal who ends up being the romantic lead, Grace Lord makes a convincing transition from reserved schoolmarm to compassionate sorta-wild child.

There are too many children and youth to go into detail, but aside from some unintelligible lines when screaming, Brooklyn Biddle as know-it-all tyke Summer is a standout. Some of the kids play the instruments impressively.

There were some sour vocals at Sunday’s matinee, but the rock ’n’ roll spirit was on point. And that’s what a school of rock should be about.

This story was originally published April 25, 2016 at 1:33 PM with the headline "Theater review: ‘School of Rock’ rocks Grapevine with young cast."