“A Musical About Star Wars” at Lied marks homecoming for creator

Michael D'Angora may live in New York now, but he was born and raised in Lincoln. This new show brings his life's work home.

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – “A Musical About Star Wars” was first conceived in New York, where Michael D’Angora lives. But he wasn’t always a part of the big NYC theater scene. He was originally from Lincoln, a part of that admittedly smaller theater culture. Friday night’s performance combines the two.

“It literally all started backstage at another musical that everyone was involved in where half of the cast loved Star Wars, like fanatics about Star Wars. The other cast was like, ‘I don’t get it’.”, Michael recalls.

From there, things really took off. A couple of years later, the musical was ready to go. It promises to be a very intentionally campy love letter to nerds everywhere.

As Michael explains it, the plot is pretty simple: “It’s a really goofy show within a show about these idiots who are the biggest Star Wars fanatics ever, and they’re trying to put on this very unauthorized Star Wars musical they wrote themselves.”

That explains why everything looks so homemade. Of course, the aspect of home features in the creator’s homecoming. “It’s always exciting to get to bring your work home”, he says. “Kind of show off, like ‘this is what I’m doing!”

Since Michael is a local and knows the territory, this particular performance takes on a bit of a local flavor.

For example, “One of the characters is a working actress and she’s doing her one-woman show at Screamers. It’s been fun trying to find all the local references to throw them into our show.”

The props, the local references, the tongue-in-cheek writing all combine to make a show that should be good for the biggest fans of Star Wars and the people who hate it the most.

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