These aren’t fatal flaws, however, and overall this is a well-executed bit of summer fluff. Diego Colon as Snoopy has terrific comic timing and a lovely tenor voice, but he was so smug in his adorableness that he coasted through “Suppertime,” which should have been a showstopper. But most of Adrian Briones’s lines as Schroeder were unintelligible on opening night, and though Adrianne Blanks is cute as Sally, she shrank back during the “Philosophy” solo. Patrick Quinlan, Mallory Portnoy, and Cyril Watson as Charlie Brown, Lucy, and Linus hit the mark every time. Some do better than others, however, at their big numbers. The actors capture their characters’ sweetness, crabbiness, and vulnerability, keeping up a lively pace throughout. The result was a massive off-Broadway success that ran nearly 1,600 performances.

Snoopy fights the Red Baron between meals, and Charlie Brown faces one disappointment after another–a stalled kite, a blown baseball game, the oblivious little red-haired girl. The next logical step was to build a stage production around the songs, which Gesner also succeeded in doing, starting on March 7, 1967, with a cast of six backed by piano and percussion at the tiny Theatre 80 St. Running around a Crayola-colored playground, Lucy fights Linus for his security blanket and swoons on Schroeder’s tiny piano while Sally equates a lost ice cream cone with Shakespearean tragedy. The updated book and score include two new songs by Andrew Lippa, among them “My New Philosophy,” a showcase for Charlie Brown’s cheeky little sister, Sally, who wasn’t part of the original show. Director Joshua Solomon and his young cast deliver a clean, simple staging of the 1999 revision of Clark M. You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown, One Theatre Company, at the Athenaeum Theatre.

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Best of Chicago 2021 ballot: Bonus round of nominations.

Who had the tiny piano in charlie brown