A musical by
Lori Ada Jaroslow & Morgan Hollingsworth
Addiction is a disease,
not a moral failing.
UPCOMING
About
Lenna Harris grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, and now at 27 years old, is living on the street, trapped in the stranglehold of addiction. She returns to her hometown--perhaps because subconsciously she's nearing rock bottom--only to find her mother is in the throes of dementia and her adopted brother has assumed responsibility for their mom. When Lenna finally acquiesces to getting help, she begins to uncover and dismantle her childhood trauma, giving way to the hope that she can get well. Through an ambient and cinematic indie-rock score, MORE THAN ALL THE SKY reveals how a family can be ravaged by drugs and alcohol. And while recovery is a grueling process, it is possible to live a sober life beyond one's wildest dreams.
History
MORE THAN ALL THE SKY began as a fifteen-minute musical, which premiered at the Lonny Chapman Theater in North Hollywood as part of the New Musicals Inc's Academy for New Musical Theater. The piece has since been expanded into a full-length musical, and was a semi-finalist for the Eugene O'Neill Center's 2022 National Music Theater Conference. In March of 2024, the musical had its first NYC presentation at The Green Room 42.
Photos from our concert at The Green Room 42
Featuring: Sydney Torin Shepherd, Karen Mason, Becca Suskauer,
Cailen Fu, Fernell Hogan, Andrea Prestinario, & Maria Cristina Posada Slye. Music Direction by Nissa Kahle.
Photos by James Murray
Writers
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Morgan Hollingsworth
- Music & Additional Lyrics
Lori Ada Jaroslow
- Book & Lyrics
Morgan is a composer and actor/musician based in San Diego, having performed regionally at such venues as La Jolla Playhouse, ACT of Connecticut, Broadway Rose Theatre Company, and CCAE Theatricals. He has written music for short films, dance pieces, and several musicals. He most recently composed music for Salty Water, a movement piece featured in La Jolla Playhouse’s 2023 WOW Festival. Short films include Fracture (currently on Hulu) and Let There Be Light (Seattle Film Fest).
The first musical he wrote, The House of Edgar Allan Poe, was part of New York Musical Festival’s 2017 Developmental Reading Series and was part of Weber State University’s 2019 main stage season. The Weber State production was invited to perform at the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival in February 2020. His second musical, Call Your Mother, was commissioned and produced by One Million Musicals and can be streamed on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. He is currently working on More Than All the Sky with librettist Lori Jaroslow that explores the difficult process of overcoming alcoholism and addiction. Morgan is an alumnus of the 2018 Johnny Mercer Songwriters Project. His folk-rock band, Satin Nickel, released their first full-length album, Shadow of Doubt, in April of 2020. Morgan received his BFA in Music Theater from UC Irvine.
@morganhollingsworth
Lori is an LA-based actor, writer and educator from New York. The Road Theatre in North Hollywood received an NEA grant to workshop Lori’s original semi-autobiographical musical The Baby Project, a piece written with composers Fonda Feingold, Noriko Olling and Angela Parrish. The show was performed as a solo piece at The Art House in Provincetown and has had developmental readings and workshops at the New York Musical Festival, The Living Room Series at The Blank Theatre in LA and the Music Stand Series at The Whitefire Theatre in LA.
Lori and composer Morgan Hollingsworth originally wrote More Than All the Sky as a fifteen-minute musical which premiered at the Lonny Chapman Theater in North Hollywood as part of the New Musicals Inc's Academy for New Musical Theater. Now a full-length musical, More Than All the Sky was a semi-finalist at The Eugene O’Neill 2022 National Music Theatre Conference. Other writing projects include a new solo piece, I Died a Week Ago Monday in New Jersey and a book of personal narratives about substitute teaching in Los Angeles.
Acting work includes on Broadway: Rizzo in Grease and Tzeitel in Fiddler On the Roof, directed by Jerome Robbins. She has performed Off-Broadway, regionally, internationally and at sea. Lori toured nationally with Donna McKechnie in Donna’s cabaret act as her only backup singer and dancer. In addition to directing and writing musicals and plays with and for kids ages 5-85, extensively, Lori developed several youth musical theater programs in LA and co-founded a musical theatre summer camp for kids called Theatricamp.
Directing work includes several solo shows including Zimmy by Brad Zimmerman, and Lori co-produced and directed the multi award-winning CD series Tell Me a Story by Amy Friedman, with music by Laura Hall which features such luminary performers as Len Cariou, and Paula Poundstone. The last CD in the series, Women of Wonder won the Audie Award for best original work.