Discover Tarzan in an immersive new musical production this Summer set to the iconic songs of Phil Collins.
By Jon Manarang July 25, 2025
Tarzan and Jane (Cred. Chase Wells)
Area Stage Co’s spin on classic Broadway musicals has put audiences right at the center of the action with their immersive renditions of Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid garnering critical acclaim. The troupe returns with their spin on the musical version of Tarzan, the box office smash 1999 animated film. Its Broadway adaptation premiered in 2006 which would only run for under a year. Yet, with a popularity amongst theater educators and international productions that have radically transformed the show, Tarzan has remained in the hearts of theatergoers. Area Stage Co’s Tarzan runs now until August 10 with tickets available here.
From the second you enter the house, the audience is greeted by a team of explorers, offering you a map and ushering you to your seat. The ushers, who are also performers in the show may offer a remark about the journey you are undertaking in the show, specifically keeping loose items under your seat and much like a theme park attraction, keeping arms and legs within the radius of your chair as performers move in and out of the space. An announcement at the beginning, very clearly commands audience members not to film the performance, keeping everyone in the world of the show.
Tarzan Climbing (Cred. Chase Wells)
Offering two different experiences, ticket buyers can opt for “Jungle Seating” which puts the crowd on more straightforward, bench-style seats that have a clear view of the entire production, or the “Explorer’s Club” which are premium seats center-stage where the audience can get right in the center of the action. For those familiar with the film, the Explorer’s Club is a more thrilling experience with performers swinging around you, as the staging makes certain scenes and performances more of a strain to see.
While typical proscenium productions of Tarzan set the scene with swaths of large green car wash fringe to replicate the jungle, here Director Giancarlo Rodaz has collaborated with Scenic Designer Raquel Dwight to set the scene in a massive canvas tent, decked out with a litany of props and Easter Eggs that make themselves known throughout the show. As with many Area Stage Co productions, Rodaz’s directorial craft hides the best tricks in plain sight. Actors swing from ropes throughout the space, transformations occur from costume trunks throughout the room, as the show takes flight, the theater truly feels alive. Lighting designer Joe Naftal’s atmospheric lighting especially heightens the depth of the room with moody theatrical spectacle.
Kala and Kerchak (Cred. Chase Wells)
As the show opens, we meet a shipwrecked British couple (Coby Oram and Grace Suárez) who find themselves washed ashore on an African coast with their newborn infant. The leopard (Gabriella Alfonso) slays the pair, leaving their child orphaned. A tribe of gorillas stumbles upon the scene, with the patriarch Kerchack (Frank Montoto) and his mate Kala (Katie Duerr). While Kerchack is reluctant to assist humans in any way, Kala, racked with pity, chooses to raise the child as her own, naming the baby Tarzan.
Though Area Stage Co’s conservatory usually works on junior and teen productions during the school months, this musical rendition of Tarzan only features a cast of eight adult actors, with the infant and child versions of the characters are portrayed by puppets. The tribe of apes, visited by Professor Porter (John Luis Mazuelos) and his crew encounter humans for the first time in the African jungle. A signature aspect of Area Stage productions, the small cast has the troupe playing multiple roles, this time as both humans and animals.
Leading the show as the titular Tarzan, Coby Oram is steadfast with a furrowed brow as the ape man. Capturing the mannerisms of a human raised by apes is no simple task and the actor swings throughout the jungle while belting with aplomb. Though most of his spoken dialogue begins with grunts and broken English, Tarzan’s inner monologue is represented through song. Despite microphone issues, Oram’s vocal clarity still filled the room with physical and vocal acrobatics, nailing a tricky Bb4 with ease. His foil, the inquisitive scientist of flora and fauna, Jane Porter is played by Siena Worland whose accent work is clearly studied as a turn of the century British gentry, resplendent in layers of petticoats.
The ensemble, aside from Terk and Kala, all rotate characters. Montoto plays both of the show’s central antagonists, the ape patriarch Kerchak and the villainous Clayton. He performs both the roles with bravado but his solo of “No Other Way” is particularly imposing with Montoto’s resonant baritone. As Jane’s father Professor Porter and a gorilla, John Luis Mazuelos brings a strong dignity to a role that was originally created as a comic foil to Jane, in this production Professor Porter welcomes the audience as explorers to his camp and Mazuelos’ sharp improv and characterization sets up the immersion from the onset.
Bubble Dance, Trashing the Camp (Cred. Chase Wells)
Young Tarzan (Grace Suárez) and his best friend Terk (Imran Hylton) are bonded as outcasts. While Terk was originally posited as a wise-cracking sidekick voiced by Rosie O’Donnell, the Broadway version and subsequent stage productions have the character typically played by a male-presenting actor. Hylton as Terk provides a certain flamboyance that allows him to understand Tarzan being “othered” by the gorillas who do not see him as one of them. Songwriter Phil Collins’ provides a new Motown-esque song “Who Better Than Me?” for Terk, but what really amplifies the character’s subtextual queer reading is the updated book by Tony-winning playwright David Henry Hwang.
Though Hwang was approached by Disney to write for Tarzan after his work on Aida, he broke into Broadway with his work on M. Butterfly, the satirical spin on the Madame Butterfly trope. Hwang approaches the text by softening the film’s massive tone problems mixing slapstick and maudlin in the outright cartoonish antics of the film. By infusing his sensibilities of “otherism” from his lens as an Asian writer, he shapes the characters and the story with a three-dimensional depth.
Though the show is beholden to the plot points of the original film, Hwang took liberty in blurring the line between human and animal. Giancarlo Rodaz, alongside Costume Designers Paulina Lozano and Sofia Ortega makes the creatures– gorillas, leopards and birds all resplendent in Victorian-inspired garb, a massive departure from the shaggy bathmats that plague the typical renditions of the show. In this bold swing to costume the apes this way, Rodaz states:
“I wanted to portray the gorillas as Jane sees them—sophisticated, with a societal structure akin to humans. Elegant 19th-century attire felt more fitting. Lion King draws its costuming from Africa’s rich cultural roots, complementing its music, but the production design of Tarzan reflects an explorer’s perspective.”
Yes, we do see Tarzan clad in a loincloth and matted hair, Jane in her signature yellow dress and Clayton’s imposing explorer’s costume, but the jungle is depicted as a reflection of England under the reign of Queen Victoria.
Typewriter (Cred. Chase Wells)
Genesis frontman Phil Collins won his first Oscar for Tarzan, and here returns to pen nine new songs for the musical. The issue with the film, often marked as the end of the Disney Renaissance era, is the diegesis of music. While Collins loads the film with bombastic, cinematic tunes, it’s never really clear who is singing or from whose perspective the songs occur from. Bringing the show to the stage, the clarity of direction makes the music more intentional. Through song, Tarzan’s complex inner thoughts are heightened, a wordless sequence of the apes “Trashin the Camp” provides a camp entr’acte and the deeply memorable power ballad “You’ll Be in My Heart” gets transformed from Kala’s lullaby to Tarzan’s ode to his mother in a heartwrenching reprise. Music director Katie Duerr balances both the vocal ensemble with pitch perfect clarity and the live rock band led by Arn Xu amps the show up further with a stylistic flair pulling from African pop to modern rock.
Area Stage Co’s immersive adventure of Tarzan takes a massive swing and lands right into a thrilling new world. Loaded with an infectious, iconic score by Phil Collins and David Henry Hwang’s intricate writing, this show has strong bones. While production choices may have inhibited the show from garnering a massive audience on the scale of The Lion King, Rodaz takes a page from the book of directors like Julie Taymor to create a revealing commentary on the line that gets obfuscated as we find the humanity in animals and the animalistic in humans. Area Stage Co’s Tarzan runs now until August 10 with tickets available here.
