Musicals | Tina Lear

	REBEL GIRLS Book and lyrics by Elise Forier-Edie Music and lyrics by Tina Lear January, 1912. In the depth of winter, in the gloomy factory town of Lawrence, Massachusetts, a desperate band of starving immigrant textile workers staged what was to become one of the most pivotal strikes in the history of the labor movement. Rebel Girls is the story of two sisters caught in the events, They find themselves on opposite sides of the strike, and must choose between the obligations of family, and their own hearts' desire. This musical has received two concert readings at CAP21 in New York City, in March of 2009, and again in November 2010.
	ESCAPE FROM THE BOX Book by Elise Forier Music and lyrics by Tina Lear Escape from the Box addresses issues of diversity with imagination and humor. Characters live in a world where, at birth, each child is presented with a magic box. When the child’s parents look inside it, whatever they see is basically the child’s destiny for the rest of his or her life. We follow the journey of eight losers (kids with unfashionable boxes—Gears, Brains, Beauty, Air, Teeth, Monster, Gobble and Tattle) as they step outside their boxes into new worlds. The play (before it was made into a musical) received Honorable Mention in the 1998 Jackie White Children’s Playwriting Awards. In 1999, with funding from the Washington State Arts Commission, the play was produced as a musical at the Whidbey Island Center for the Arts, starring Tina and a cast of Langley Middle School students. And in October of 2004, it was given a three-week run at DreamWrights Theatre in York, Pennsylvania.
	CATHY'S CREEK Book and lyrics by Elise Forier Music and lyrics by Tina Lear This is a story about what it takes to stand up for what you know is right, and how one girl can change the world. Iowa farm girl Cathy Scruggs gets an assignment from her teacher to write a term paper on Joan of Arc. While working on her paper, the lonely, awkward teen suddenly finds the French farm maid has come to life and can speak to her. The two become fast friends and Cathy is introduced into a world of incredible courage and daring as her new friend sets about conquering the marauding English in her beloved France. When Cathy is called upon to do something heroic in her own time, she must find the power within herself to speak out against the prevailing pressures and destructive forces working against her. After the success of “Escape from the Box,” Whidbey Island Center for the Arts commissioned Elise and Tina to write this family musical for their main stage season in 2001. Since then, it was selected for development by the 2002-2003 Waldo M. and Grace C. Bonderman National Youth Theatre Playwriting Competition and Development Workshop (where it received a public reading at the Indiana Repertory Theatre April of 2003). It received a full production at Stages Theatre in Hopkins, Minnesota (near Minneapolis), running for three weeks in October of 2004 and was published in the summer of 2005. Scripts, demo CDs and music can be obtained by Dramatic Publishing .
	VALERIE AND THE BEAR Book and lyrics by Elise Forier Music and lyrics by Tina Lear Valerie and the Bear is loosely based on the medieval French romantic poem, Valentin et Orsin. Part fable, part Commedia del Arte and part Warner Brothers cartoon, this play tells the story of a gutsy girl named Valerie, who befriends a wild boy who has lived his whole life in the forest with the bears. Accompanied by her giddy sister Ginger, a mysterious gypsy woman and stalked by the odious Pirate King, Valerie sets out on a journey to the Great Blue Blazes, where she hopes to have the secrets of her life revealed. Valerie and the Bear is a lively, hilarious and ultimately very moving story; but like all fairy tales, it has deep lessons for us all about the nature of courage and the importance of forgiveness and love. This musical play was selected for development by the Seven Devils Playwrights Conference, where it received a staged reading in McCall, Idaho in the summer of 2002.