Be Our Guest with Manuele Mizzi & Carlos Bastarrachea (Doctor Bird Productions - Jekyll and Hyde The Musical in Concert)

Musical Theatre Radio presents "Be Our Guest"

Manuele Mizzi is a Jamaican-Italian tenor, Manuele Adrian Mizzi discovered his love for performing at a very young age. Growing up in Markham he attended Unionville High School for the Arts later obtaining a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Voice Performance from York University under the tutelage of renowned Canadian operatic soprano Stephanie Bogle and having also studied with renowned European soprano Galina Lumkosky.

With a repertoire ranging from pop to musical theatre to opera and classical, he has performed in a wide variety of venues throughout North America. His musical theatre credits include performing the roles of Schroeder in You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown, Japheth in Two by Two, Thomas in Emmanuel the Musical (New York City), Barnaby in Hello Dolly, Shrek in Shrek Tateh in Ragtime, The Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz, and Dickon in The Secret Garden among many others.As a soloist, Manuele Adrian Mizzi has performed with The Neapolitan Connection, Vocal Horizons Chamber Choir, Greater Toronto Philharmonic, All the King’s Voice’s and the Burlington Civic Choir among others.Manuele Adrian Mizzi also has a long career of teaching under his belt. As an avid pianist, accompanist, musical director and director, he has been working with all ages from 3-99 for the last 23 years. His directing and musical directing credits include musicals, plays, pantos and recitals.

Doctor Bird Productions is his next foray into the performing world - a place to bring his love of direction, performing and colaboration together. The doctor bird is Jamaica's national bird and his love of his heritage and love for the beauty of the animal world helped him bring this new company to life to soar like the great hummingbird.

Carlos Bastarrachea is playing Jekyll/Hyde in Doctor Bird Production of Jekyll and Jyde the musical as well as "Phoebus" in The Hunchback of Notre Dame and “Pirelli” in Sweeney Todd. This is his second show after moving to Canada from his hometown in Mexico City. Prior to Doctor Bird, his previous roles include Speing Awakening (Melchior), Once on This Island (Daniel) and Lion King (Timon). Carlos and his darling wife Emilia would like to thank Manuele and Ethan for a second chance at making magic and encouraging representation from people with disabilities. Doctor Bird Productions is looking to bring something fresh and new to Toronto's performance world. We want to put on productions that stretch the imagination, that bring smiles to peoples faces and help to make people walk away with new thoughts and new ideas. We hope to put on new productions in Canada and hope to reimagine shows that have been so important to the makeup of Torontos performance world.

We are committed to the practice of color-conscious casting. We recognize that considerations of race, including how race and ethnicity shape society and the stories we tell, are vital components to the casting process. Also critical to the casting process are audience perceptions of race on stage and in film.