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Live for the first time since 1986...
The Rag Dolly Revue
Art by November Gorrell/NovellaG
Arcola Masonic Lodge, 111 S Locust St, Arcola, IL
June 7th, doors open at 11am, show begins at 11:30
Free admission! There will be a donation box by the door
Music and lyrics by Joe Raposo
Additional music and lyrics by Hazel Hawlik & Silas Green
Performers:
Presley Ellison, Gwyneth Gaunt, November Gorrell, Hazel Hawlik, Grey Lee, McKenah Rose, & Brooklyn Williams
Musical Numbers:
| Gingham and Yarn | Ragettes & Company |
| Carry On | Poppa & Marcella |
| Diagnosis | Doctors |
| The Light | Raggedy Andy, Baby, Raggedy Ann, Teddy, Company |
| Blue | Camel, Marcella, Raggedy Ann |
| Rag Dolly | Raggedy Ann |
| Never Get Away | Bat |
| What Did I Lose/Somewhere | Mommy, Raggedy Ann |
| Gingham and Yarn Reprise | Company |
Art by Grey Lee
Live for the first time since 1986, come experience a selection of songs from the previously lost musical!
The Raggedy Ann Revival Effort will be performing a showcase of songs from the Rag Dolly musical on June 7th, during the Arcola Raggedy Ann Rally. Our cast will be singing concert-style alongside piano accompaniment by Hazel Hawlik. The Rag Dolly Revue will also be the public debut of new music arrangements and lyric revisions, with permission from the Raposo estate to use this performance as a test before discussing proper workshops. This is the first step towards our goal of a full revival.
The show will be part of the festivities taking place during the Raggedy Ann Rally in Arcola, Illinois, a yearly get-together of Raggedy Ann fans that has been gathering since 1989. The organizers are very supportive of our Revival Effort and helping us get this performance off the ground.
Interested in helping out? We're looking for volunteers for ushers and greeters! Contact us through our social media or on the Raggedy Ann Rally Discord Server.
Not attending the rally but would still like to help? Please consider donating to our Ko-Fi to help us cover the venue cost.
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Welcome to the Raggedy Ann Revival Effort homepage!
The Raggedy Ann Revival Effort (or R.A.R.E.) is an online volunteer effort dedicated to preserving, archiving, and eventually reviving the 1986 Broadway musical Raggedy Ann.
Our goal is to restore and revive the show by recovering and cleaning up the script, re-creating missing orchestrations for the music, and recovering any lost content we can find, so that hopefully we may one day put on the Raggedy Ann musical ourselves! We started in Feburary of 2021 and operate mainly on discord, with a central hub of organizers who archive and support the work done by the larger community.
Come explore our archives, learn a little about the show, and join us if you like!
| Background |
The Raggedy Ann musical is known as Raggedy Ann in it's 1984 & Broadway productions, and Rag Dolly in the 1985 production and Moscow tour. The book was written by William Gibson (of The Miracle Worker) and the music composed by Joe Raposo (of Sesame St. and The Muppet Show). The production came into being when producer Patricia Snyder saw the 1977 animated Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure and asked the movie's composer, none other than Joe Raposo, to join her in creating a new musical. Gibson was inspired by the legend of Raggedy Ann's origins - in which Johnny Gruelle created the character to cheer up his sick and dying daughter, Marcella - to write a show that dealt with grief, death, and how stories can bring us hope and comfort when life is difficult to face.
In 1984, the show's workshops opened to mixed reviews, critics saw promise in the concept but many parents complained of the darker themes they were not expecting out of such a child-friendly property. The show went on, however, and the next year it was chosen to play a important role in a cultural exchange between the Empire State Institute for the Performing Arts and Moscow's Musical Theater for Children. The cast spent New Years Eve, 1985, on a plane to the USSR, where they would spend the coming weeks performing for the delighted children and political leaders of Moscow.
They returned home with high spirits following the incredibly positive reception. The show started on the tracks to Broadway with a tryout at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. from August 23 to September 21, 1986, now with half the original cast replaced. In October, the show moved to the Nederlander Theater on Broadway for previews. Under the harsh lights and even harsher critics of Broadway, the charming little oddity was clearly out of place. Raggedy Ann ultimately raised the curtains for opening night on October 15th... and promptly lowered them again three days later. With no cast album, no licensing, and very little fanfare, the show faded into obscurity.