Last year’s musical revived at Elizabeth Forward
By CHRISTINE HAINES
chaines@yourmvi.com
The show must go on —eventually.
That could be the theme for this year’s musical at Elizabeth Forward High School. “The Drowsy Chaperone” was supposed to have been staged last school year, but was canceled at the last minute because of the pandemic that closed schools and much of the rest of society.
“Most of the leads were juniors. We were ready. We just had finishing touches to put on,” said director Alana Wieclaw.
Most of the actors will be in the roles they had last year, though a few have moved up to larger roles. A major change to the performance will be the lack of a live orchestra in the pit. The performance will instead use the soundtrack provided by a production company for the show.
The musical opens tonight and runs through Sunday for a limited audience. Pay-per-view recorded performances will be available to the public next week.
Wieclaw said the students couldn’t have been more ready last year when the pandemic tossed them a monkey wrench.
“We had all the costumes tagged and ready to go when we got the notice to shut down,” Wieclaw said.
The entire production will be a little smaller, scaled back on stage, behind stage and in the pit.
“We normally have 40 kids on stage and this year we have 28,” Wieclaw said. “We didn’t bring on any new ensemble members. Normally there are 90 involved in the production. This year there are 44. These were the kids who were involved in this production.”
Wieclaw said 21 members of the cast and crew are seniors this year. Adaptations have been made on stage to keep everyone safe beyond limiting the size of the cast, ensemble and crew.
“We got recommendations from other schools who did fall shows or junior high musicals to use clear masks that from the audience you can’t even see,” Wieclaw said. “We are working with the mics to cut down on the extra noise from their breathing.”
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