With (Robot) Love From Korea

MUSICAL THEATRE HAS BEEN CALLED A UNIQUELY American art form, but that’s no longer the case (if it ever was). That’s at least in part because musicals from the U.S. have toured the world, and some of the countries they’ve visited have begun developing musicals of their own. South Korea, in particular, has developed an entire industry of new work.

Now Americans will get a chance to sample the results, as the first musical from South Korea to receive a major U.S. regional production, , comes to the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Jan. 21-Feb. 16. Not that there’s a hard line between the show’s American and Korean roots: It is the creation of an American, Will Aronson, who wrote the music, and a Korean, Hue Park, who wrote the lyrics; the pair co-wrote the show’s book. Neither collaborator is a newcomer to the other’s culture: Aronson wrote music for , presented at 2009’s New York Musical Festival as part of a partnership with Korea’s Daegu International Musical Festival, and Park studied visual art in New York City, which is