Joe Brancato and Andrew M. Horn, the artistic and executive directors of Stony Point’s Penguin Rep — the magical little-theater-that-can — have announced the latest May-to-October season for their barn theater on Crickettown Road. The 35th season appears to adhere to the duo’s recent prescription for the subscription house: one madcap… Read More →
One of the best things about dropping by a rehearsal at Lakeland High School is the opportunity to see the stage magic Jim DelVecchio and Co. come up with each year. This year — for Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma!” — there’s a full-sized chimney on Aunt Eller’s house, a working windmill… Read More →
A few years back, Susi Cummings, the poobah at Putnam Valley High School’s PAC, began the Stage Managers in Training program, to teach kids all things technical in the world of stagecraft. They would learn from upperclassmen. They would learn from the professionals who design sets, lights, costumes and props…. Read More →
It has been too long since I last visited the kids at Putnam Valley High School and their state-of-the-art theater, run by one of my favorite folks, Susi Cummings. Susi has been developing stage-savvy kids for years. Read about one — senior Rachel Fitzgerald — here. The kids at “A… Read More →
Meanwhile, in Chappaqua, Horace Greeley High School director Christopher Schraufnagel — “Schrauf” to his students — is facing his annual dilemma: crowd control. The senior musical is a real rite of passage at Greeley, a fund-raiser for the senior class that draws a huge cast. This year, it’s 190. In… Read More →
In one of those what-are-the-odds coincidences there are two schools in Westchester that present seniors-only musicals—Mamaroneck and Horace Greeley—and both schools have chosen the campy but funny musical “Xanadu” to go out on — on the same weekend in late April. At Mamaroneck, director Stacie Moye admits, a bit sheepishly,... Read More →
Eastchester High School’s auditorium is always a-buzz when I stop by a rehearsal, with the indefatigable John Gwardyak at the center of it all, barking out commands in his own particularly genial way. This year, the show is a biggie, “Beauty and the Beast,” and Gwardyak admits he was a… Read More →
ArtsRock continues to expand the cultural conversation in Rockland County with interesting conversations. The next one is Saturday from 7:30 to 10:30 p.m. at Tappan Zee High School, when ArtsRock’s Elliott Forrest gathers three of his public-radio colleagues — Brian Lehrer, host of WNYC’s “The Brian Lehrer Show,” Brooke Gladstone,... Read More →
If you look up the Yiddish term “nebbish,” you’ll learn it’s a timid, weak or ineffectual person, someone easily pushed around. This week, in Valhalla High School’s production of the Howard Ashman-Alan Menken doo-wop musical “Little Shop of Horrors,” James Fulgenzi plays Seymour Krelborn, a character whose photo could accompany… Read More →
Raevyn Thigpen has a big voice — and a big role to fill. In Woodlands High School’s production of “Once on This Island” this week, the 17-year-old junior plays Erzulie, the Goddess of Love, a constant presence in the life of the central character, TiMoune. “At the beginning, I show… Read More →
Last fall, Michael Johnson traded one love, basketball, for another: dance. “I decided that dancing was my passion,” the soft-spoken Spring Valley senior says. “I still play basketball, but I love to dance.” Johnson is now enrolled in several dance classes (ballet and jazz) at Suffern’s Dance Loft. And can… Read More →
Diehard fans of the NBC drama “Smash” — the behind-the-scenes look at a Broadway-bound Marilyn Monroe musical — likely know a thing or two about musical theater. They likely know, for example, that the musical drama’s original songs are penned by Marc Shaiman and Nanuet native Scott Wittman (left to… Read More →
John MacLean has taught high school English for 30 years, 26 of them at Woodlands High School. “That’s more Ethan Fromes than I ever want to have to think of,” says the mild-mannered Croton-on-Hudson resident who’ll retire this spring. He teaches upperclassmen a mix of classics and modern works, from… Read More →
There are 17 high-school musicals opening this weekend. Here’s a look at two musicals on four stages. There are other musicals, hundreds of them. There are other weekends, 16 of them in the high-school-musical season that stretches from January into May. But for some reason two schools — Ramapo and… Read More →
Paula Soricelli, who produces the shows at Valhalla High School, goes the extra mile for each production. Don’t believe me? When Valhalla presents “Little Shop of Horrors” at month’s end, Soricelli will be inside the giant Audrey II plant. Love that. Also love that Principal Jonathon Thomas will be voicing… Read More →
They were doing a vocal rehearsal at Spring Valley High School when I arrived yesterday, but director-choreographer Stacey Tirro and producer Maureen Morgan showed their usual hospitality, introducing me to members of the “Footloose” cast, including Michael Johnson, who plays the rebel Ren, the fish-out-of-water in this can’t-stand-still musical based… Read More →
Fans of the NBC drama “Smash” — which airs tonight at 10 — have been looking forward to tonight’s episode, titled “The Workshop,” in which potential backers get to see the musical that has been taking shape. Local fans might like to know that Nyack has been seen in “Smash”... Read More →
Westchester’s getting all cutting edge — and it appears that the tiny Westchester Sandbox Theatre is the epicenter of it. Having just produced the New York regional premiere of “Next to Normal,” WST will host another regional premiere (by Little Radical Theatrics) — of the hysterical, pseudo-historical “Bloody Bloody Andrew… Read More →
Harry Rios has been introducing kids to musicals at Alexander Hamilton High for three years. Doing a musical means learning lines and lyrics, rehearsing how to move on the stage, projecting your voice. There are songs to be learned, costumes to gather, sets to build and set changes to refine…. Read More →
This is the start of the season’s busiest week at high schools across the Lower Hudson Valley, with 17 shows set to open this week on stages from Yorktown to Suffern, Harrison to Tappan Zee. Some call it Production Week, or Tech Week. For most, it’s Hell Week. By whichever… Read More →
Opening this week at high schools across the Lower Hudson Valley:
When she was in eighth grade, on a whim, Anna Ledwith auditioned for a role in “How to Eat Like a Child” at Haldane High School. “I got a part in the ensemble, and we were at our first Saturday rehearsal where we were set-painting and I guess I started… Read More →
Katie Leenig can’t stop smiling. The Tappan Zee High School senior plays “Charity Hope Valentine,” the Fandango Ballroom hostess who is looking for love in the cold Manhattan of the 1960s in “Sweet Charity.” “I love playing her because she always believes everything will turn out great,” Leenig says. “When… Read More →
One might have thought playing Millie Dillmount in “Thoroughly Modern Millie” last year would have given Cayla Pettinato the right to call herself a tapper. But the Harrison High School senior, captain of the school’s dance team, says learning the double pull-back — hands out, shuffling both feet back at… Read More →
Isaac Marshall’s friend asked the Edgemont High School senior how he likes playing the villain “Jud Fry” in Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma!” “I told him I’m not playing the villain,” Marshall says. “I’m playing the most tragic character in the show.”
Ghosts abound in “The Secret Garden” — the musical adaptation of the much-loved Frances Hodgson Burnett story about a girl, a boy and a garden that is reborn — on stage this week at Brewster High School. The company includes Robert Rodriguez, who plays the haunted hunchback Archibald Craven. “He… Read More →
It’s late on a school night, and they’re dropping like flies at Suffern High School. The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Sweeney Todd, is hard at work, welcoming clients to his barber’s chair of vengeance. Men climb the stairs, they don’t come down. Suffern senior David Stedge plays the murderous… Read More →
Mykaela Copeland has been piling up dream role after dream role in her four years at Ossining High School: wicked stepsister in “Cinderella,” Belle in “Beauty and the Beast,” Eponine in “Les Miserables” and, now, the title role in the Elton John-Tim Rice musical, “Aida.” “This has a different element,”... Read More →
Shane Cronin — who plays the “Master of Ceremonies” in Kander & Ebb’s “Cabaret” — has a confession to make. “I had never heard of ‘Cabaret’ before,” says the Yorktown High School senior who leads the company. “I had to find a different character that I’ve never played before.”
Cole Miller is kind of new at this musical theater thing. The John Jay High School senior this week plays Sky Masterson — a guy who’ll roll his fellow gamblers, to give himself a shot with a mission doll — in “Guys and Dolls.”
