Theater Review - Broadway Baby
Babyface brings Love Makes Things Happen to Atlanta
It’s been years since Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds hung his hat in Atlanta, but fans of the producer, songwriter and LaFace Records co-founder will get the next best thing to a live Babyface visit with the Atlanta premiere of the musical Love Makes Things Happen.
Playing April 2-7 at the Atlanta Civic Center, Love Makes Things Happen features music and lyrics by the 10-time Grammy Award winner, with songs including “Superwoman,” “Soon As I Get Home From Work,” “Ready or Not” and the intriguingly titled “Whip Appeal.”
Written and directed by David E. Talbert, Love Makes Things Happen depicts a star-crossed romance between a recently divorced dot-com executive (Dawn Robinson of En Vogue) and a minimum-wage mailroom clerk played by Kevon Edmonds, brother of Babyface and a music performer in his own right with such groups as After 7. The cast also includes Coko of the group SWV and Def Comedy Jam comedian Joe Torry for comic relief.
In the midst of its 22-city tour, Love Makes Things Happen is the first venture of Talbert’s Urban Broadway Series, which develops and stages plays, musicals and gospel-themed theatrical events for urban audiences. Following his collaboration with Babyface, Talbert next teams up with actor-filmmaker Robert Townsend for the touring play If I Could Turn Back the Hands of Time this fall.
Love Makes Things Happen plays April 2-7 at the Atlanta Civic Center, Tues.-Sat. at 8 p.m. and Sun. 7:30 p.m. $19.50-$34.50. 404-817-8700. www.urbanbroadway.com.??