In the Wings

Ramsey High School in Bergen County leads the list of nominees for the 16th annual Metropolitan High School Theater Awards announced Friday. The awards will be presented June 3 at the newly reopened Paramount Hudson Valley theater in Peekskill. Ramsey’s production of “Crazy for You” racked up an impressive 18... Read More →

A lot of excitement for high-school-musical kids across the Lower Hudson Valley this morning as the nominations for the 2013 Metropolitan High School Theater Awards are just a few hours away. At 4 p.m., producer Danielle Rudess and I will sit down in the rehearsal studio at Helen Hayes Youth... Read More →

The 16th annual Metropolitan High School Theater Awards are just around the corner and there’s news to report. Producer Danielle Rudess tells me the evening (June 3 in Peekskill) will be hosted by Westchester’s Broadway star, John Treacy Egan of Larchmont, who is currently in the final weeks playing Chief... Read More →

Joe Brancato is fond of saying he likes plays that entertain while “stirring the gray matter.” In 35 years as founding artistic director at Stony Point’s Penguin Rep, he has presented new works that have done both. Season 36 looks like more of the same in the 108-seat barn theater... Read More →

Victoria Fried has only been at photography for three years, but the 18-year-old Ossining High School senior is certainly making up for lost time, compiling an award-winning portfolio of images that dare you to look away. In an age where digital photography promises the immediate payback of rapid-fire shutters delivering... Read More →

Changing my musicals hat into my high-school-arts hat (a top hat for a fedora) to chat with Tori Fried, a senior at Ossining High School who is old school when it comes to photography. She shoots on actual film. Remember film? Tori does, and prefers it to digital photography for... Read More →

Jesse Tyler Ferguson sounded like a broken record this morning as he announced the 2013 Tony nominees for best lighting design for a musical. “Kenneth Posner for ‘Kinky Boots,’” the “Modern Family” star read. “Kenneth Posner for ‘Pippin,’” he continued. “Kenneth Posner for “Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella,” Ferguson said, with... Read More →

Lexie Frare’s days these days are fueled by Venti Starbucks coffees with soy milk, bags of candy and adrenaline. It’s a frenetic time for Frare, who is choreographing three youth-theater shows — “Carrie” and “Fame” in Rockland and “Godspell” in White Plains — while directing and choreographing her first high-school... Read More →

Adam Santagata has played young men in love before. The Walter Panas High School senior was Freddy Eynsford-Hillin “My Fair Lady” last year, head over heels with Eliza Doolittle to the point where he was even infatuated with her address. Last fall, he was Rolf, the 17-going-on-18 Austrian telegraph delivery... Read More →

They’re both rebels in leather jackets, but New Rochelle High School junior A.J. Salvaggio, 16, sees one big difference between Danny Zuko — the greaser with a soft spot in “Grease,” whom he played at The Ursuline School — and Jonny Warner, the character he plays in “Zombie Prom” on... Read More →

Dropped by Walter Panas for my second musical visit of the school year. Last fall, it was “The Sound of Music.” This spring, it’s “The Music Man.” I joked with director Jim Filippelli that he could have just done one production—“The Sound of Music Man”—but he wasn’t buying it. Here’s... Read More →

Dropped by Alexander Hamilton High School the other day to catch director Lexie Frare and her team working with kids from grades 7 through 12, and two elementary-school siblings who were there watching their sisters rehearse. Hamilton’s program is new, Frare is a nurturing pro and the future is bright.... Read More →

Jack Titcomb is just a sophomore, but what the 16-year-old says goes backstage at Sleepy Hollow High School’s production of “The Wiz” this weekend. Like all good stage managers, during the performances this weekend, Titcomb will be multitasking: sometimes on the headset with the crew in the lighting and sound... Read More →

Afua Yeboah, 16, a junior at Peekskill High School, has stage presence to burn. As TiMoune, the island girl who finds favor with the gods in “Once on this Island” this weekend, she skips and dances across the stage, defying you to look elsewhere. It’s a role that suits her.... Read More →

If you know “9 to 5,” it’s likely the 1980 movie starring Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda as secretaries who teach their chauvinist boss a lesson or two. It came to Broadway as a musical in 2009 — with 17 songs by Parton, whose character was played by... Read More →

We dropped by a rehearsal for “Once on This Island” at Peekskill High School and were, frankly, blown away by the voices and the movement of the opening number. Director Scarlett Antonia, who breathed life back into Peekskill’s theater program years ago before moving on to create a youth theater... Read More →