REVIEW: Grab Your Blue Suede Shoes and Get ‘All Shook Up’ at Meadow Brook Theatre
January 11, 2026 by Sarah Hovis Leave a Comment
Come in from the cold and get warmed up with the white-hot musical, All Shook Up, running until February 1, 2026, on the campus of Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan
 

All Shook Up is the second collaboration between Meadow Brook Theatre (MBT) and Oakland University School of Music, Theatre and Dance (OUSMTD). Last year’s inaugural partnership between MBT and OUSMTD was an electric presentation of Footloose, but in my opinion, All Shook Up blows that production out of the water.

Set in a no-name Midwest town in 1955, the story takes place over a 24-hour period. And as the R&B singer Dinah Washington sang, “What a diff’rence a day” makes in the lives of these individuals.

With a book by Joe DiPietro, All Shook Up is a jukebox musical inspired by and featuring over 25 Elvis Presley songs, infused with a new attitude and fresh perspective. For example, I didn’t know I needed a mashup of “Hound Dog” and “Teddy Bear” until I heard it. Creative arrangements and smooth harmonies give these well-known classics new life, and I promise you, you will never hear these songs the same way again.

The central figure in the story is Chad (Nick Cortazzo), a troubadour roustabout who brings swagger and his blue suede shoes attitude to the dead and dull town (“C’mon Everybody”). Cortazzo has a mesmerizing magnetism, and what I appreciate most about his portrayal of Chad is his sincerity. Thankfully, Cortazzo doesn’t try to do some cheesy Elvis impersonation. The general vibe is there, but he puts his own flavor on the role, and that’s what sells it. He gives off mysterious bad boy vibes without being smarmy and has you swooning from his first hip swivel (“Jailhouse Rock”).