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A Chorus Line

It's a modern classic — the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize award-winning story of 17 dancers auditioning for an available eight spots in a chorus line, woven together with music by Marvin Hamlisch. Theatre Under the Stars is bringing A Chorus Line back to Houston, this time to Miller Outdoor Theatre (we don't envy those hardworking dancers pounding the boards in the July heat). Martin Harvey has a lead role, playing Zach, the demanding director who asks them not only to dance for him, but to divulge some of their innermost secrets as a way of winnowing them down. Still up in the air is whether he'll perform in his native British accent (as he did in a New Jersey production) or do American (which he does a lot as well).

Saying the story was set at a time when dancers were ''at the bottom of the pile,'' Harvey says one of the great legacies of A Chorus Line is what it did for so many dancers. ''I don't know how many thousands and thousands of dancers have had jobs because of A Chorus Line,'' he says. Some of the language has been changed to remove '70s pop culture references, but the songs — ''One,'' ''I Hope I Get It,'' ''What I Did for Love'' — remain. Mitzi Hamilton, the model for the Val character in the original Michael Bennett production and who also performed in that role in London and on Broadway, is directing and choreographing. (Harvey got his New Jersey role after auditioning for her there.)

8:15 p.m. daily. Through July 21. 6000 Hermann Park Drive. For information, call 281-373-3386 or visit tuts.com. Free.
Tuesdays-Sundays, 8:15 p.m. Starts: July 16. Continues through July 21, 2013

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Margaret Downing is the editor-in-chief who oversees the Houston Press newsroom and its online publication. She frequently writes on a wide range of subjects.
Contact: Margaret Downing