Anastasia at the Eccles

I have always been fascinated by Russia and the rumor that the Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanov may have survived the slaughter of her family during the Russian Revolution is incredibly compelling (even though it has been debunked by DNA evidence).  The musical adaptation of this story has been at the top of my list for a long time and I finally had the chance to see Anastasia last night at the Eccles Theater.  I really loved it!  Young Anastasia (Marley Sophia) is given a music box by her grandmother the Dowager Empress (Gerri Weagraff) before she leaves to live in Paris.  Several years later the Imperial family is arrested and executed by Bolsheviks but there is a rumor in St. Petersburg that Anastasia somehow survived.  Two conmen named Dmitry (Sam McLellan) and Vlad (Bryan Seastrom) want to find someone to impersonate her in order to demand money from the Dowager Empress.  They find an old music box once owned by the Romanovs and eventually encounter a young woman named Anya (Kyla Stone) who is suffering from amnesia.  As they try to teach her about the Grand Duchess, she recognizes the music box and starts remembering the Imperial family.  They escape the clutches of a Bolshevik general named Gleb (Brandon Delgado), who vows to finish the job of executing the Romanovs begun by his father, and eventually arrive in Paris.  With the help of Countess Lily (Madeline Raube), a lady in waiting, they introduce Anya to the Dowager Empress but is she really Anasatsia and does she want the life of a Grand Duchess?  I was really impressed by Stone as Anastasia and I loved her songs "In My Dreams," "Once Upon a December," and "Journey to the Past."  I also really enjoyed her facial expressions as she moves from saying the lines given to her by Dmitry and Vlad to remembering the events they describe.  I was absolutely blown away by the set, which consists of a series of columns, and the use of projections to bring the cities of St. Petersburg and Paris to life.  St. Petersburg is one of my favorite cities so it was really fun for me to recognize the Winter Palace, the Peter and Paul Fortress, the Nevsky Prospect, the Neva River, and the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood.  Several of the musical numbers are staged so brilliantly!  The use of red lighting in "The Last Dance of the Romanovs," which shows the transition from the Romanov family waltzing inside the Winter Palace to their eventual overthrow by the Bolsheviks, is incredibly powerful, the ghosts of the Romanov family dancing around Anya in "Once Upon a December" and "A Nightmare" is absolutely otherworldly, and the staging of Swan Lake is quite impressive because it includes the actual ballet (with Lauren Teyke as Odette, Taylor Stanger as Prince Siegfried, and Dakota Hoar as Von Rothbert) while Anya, Dmitry, Gleb, and the Dowager Empress sing "Quartet at the Ballet" in gold box seats on each side of the stage.  So many moments took my breath away and I am really happy that I was finally able to check this show off my list!  It runs at the Eccles Theater through February 20 but every performance is sold out!