PHOTO BY LOIS G REE NFIELD

Right BIG kids in the dance
ensemble.

Below: There are a whole lot
of BIG rehearsals going on.

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BY BRENDA ABRAMS JOSEPHS SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

PHOTO BY T.L. BOSTON

Top: Daniel Jenkins is hoping
for a touchdown with his lead
role in BIG.

The big news is that BIG is
opening at the Fisher Theatre
on Tuesday, Feb. 13.

II t's going to be a BIG deal next week when
a new musical makes its world premiere at
the Fisher.
Originally, BIG was scheduled to open in
Boston. However, a six-month production
delay plus, what producer Kenneth Green-
blatt calls a terrific deal offered by the Ned-
erlander organization, has given Detroiters the
opportunity to see BIG in its only pre-Broadway
run. BIG opens on Broadway at the Shubert The-
atre on April 25.
For many theater goers, the theme is a famil-
iar one: Be careful what you wish for, you just
might get it. But, like most 13-year-old boys, Josh
Baskin chooses to ignore it. He has one wish — he
wants to be big.
When, through a bizarre twist of fortune, his
wish is granted, Josh appears as a grown man on
the outside, but remains a 13-year-old boy on the
inside. As Josh lands a job working for a toy com-
pany and falls in love for the first time, he expe-
riences these events through the eyes of a grown
man, but with the longing heart and hormones of
an adolescent.
The cast of BIG includes Daniel Jenkins as Josh
— Tom Hanks' role in the movie. A Tony nominee
for his performance in Big River, Jenkins was last
seen on Broadway in Tony Kushner's Pulitzer
Prize-winning epic, Angels in America.