The Very Last . . . Mountain Lion was one of two musicals selected for the Next Stages program of Berkeley’s Musical Cafe, resulting in two table readings, one in September and one in December 2019. After an encouraging assessment from the Apples and Oranges organization in New York, the author invited Jon Kull to join the project as co-composer to add professional dazzle to the score. Several songs were recorded in studio in L.A. in 2022 to create a submission package for entry in competitions, festival opportunities and production pitches. Consequently, the show’s finale, Roar Again, was featured in the 2023 New Works Cabaret of Musical Writers Academy (see video), and the show is one of four musicals selected for the Musical Cafe’s 2023 showcase of highlights at the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley.
Here’s news about other shows by the author:
Making Twain, a full-length screenplay, won the Golden Palm grand prize at the Beverly Hills Film Festival and won the grand prize for comedy in the Screenplay Festival (Sherman Oaks), both in 2022.
The short play The Talk was selected “Best in Snow” out of 654 entries by the Snowdance Comedy Festival in Racine, Wisconsin, after 25 sold-out performances in February and March 2020. The play subjects a 12-year-old boy to his very uncool father’s misguided attempt to convert the traditional father-son sex talk into a rap song. It doesn’t go well.
The short play The Colonoscopy and Its Many Teachings was selected for performance at the Durango Colorado Art Center in summer 2020, the City Theater of Independence Missouri in Summer 2021 and the Berkeley Public Library in 2023. The short play The Whistle was selected by This Moment Productions for its online short play series in July 2021.
Greener Gardens, a 15-minute musical (book by Sara Biel, music by Jon Kull, lyrics by Greg Beattie), was written as the culmination of a year-long intensive study of musical theater in the Core Curriculum of New Musicals, Inc. It was presented to a sold-out audience in July 2019 in Hollywood.
The short musical For Richer or for Poorer (book by Kim Bixler, music by Michael Turnblom, lyrics by Greg Beattie) was presented by New Musicals, Inc. to a sold-out audience in July 2021 in Hollywood.
About Greg Beattie
Greg has written several plays, musicals and screenplays. His feature-length screenplay “Making Twain” won the Golden Palm grand prize at the 22nd annual Beverly Hills Film Festival in June 2022. His short play “The Talk” won the grand prize (out of 654 entries) at the SnowDance Comedy Festival in Racine Wisconsin in February 2020. He wrote the lyrics for two one-act musicals produced on stage by New Musicals, Inc. in Hollywood in 2019 and in 2021. He has had two additional short plays competitively selected and produced by regional theaters in Missouri and Colorado, and for a nationwide online play festival. He is also the author of children’s stories and poems that have been published in the U.S. and the U.K.
Before turning to writing full time, Greg was a singer and songwriter for decades with the band Calaveras and wrote musical comedy material for Bay Area fundraisers and for the annual musical extravaganza of a large San Francisco company. He has won several songwriting competitions, including the prestigious NewFolk Prize at Peter Yarrow’s Kerrville (TX) Folk Festival and the Grand Prize in the West Coast Songwriters’ International Song Contest. His songs have been placed in television shows and major motion pictures and played on radio, streamed on the Internet and featured at major televised events. He holds a philosophy degree from Stanford University and a JD from Harvard Law School.
About Jon Kull
Jon Kull maintains a busy and eclectic schedule covering many musical disciplines. He recently composed a new score for the Buster Keaton comedy The Goat, which was commissioned and performed by the Dallas Chamber Symphony. Jon also scored the live-action short Aquarium, which premiered at the Slamdance Festival and was selected for the Cannes Short Film Corner. Other feature film original score credits include Lone Wolf, Retribution, Be Somebody, and festival favorite The Real Old Testament. Kull has also written music for commercials, among them efforts for Neutrogena, J.C. Penney, Snapple, and Canon. As a film orchestrator Jon has amassed over 200 credits, working with many of the top composers in Hollywood on some of their biggest projects, including James Horner (Avatar, Troy), Ludwig Göransson (Black Panther, The Mandalorian), Marco Beltrami (Hellboy, The Wolverine) and James Newton Howard (Raya and the Last Dragon, Fantastic Beasts).
The Very Last One and Only Highly Endangered Mountain Lion in Pennsylvania 