A dream come true

When I came to WPI in '97 it was after two years of being involved in my high school musicals as well as show choir. (For those who don't know what show choir is, basically its choreographed songs, usually show tunes, and put together in a group to form a theme. Our group usually went for more of a concert medley of a full Broadway show such as Tommy or Jesus Christ Superstar than just a mix of songs) I loved singing but I was starting to really enjoy doing more than just standing on a stage and singing. It was fun learning all the dance moves in Show Choir and learning lines and blocking in the musicals. Upon arriving at WPI I immediately went to both the initial meetings of Masque and Glee Club. I quickly found out that Masque only did stage plays (they have done musicals but only once in a great while and each one affirming the mantra that "musicals just can't get done at WPI), and that it was pretty much an either or situation with Glee Club and Masque. There just really wasn't time to fully dedicate to both.

I never stopped wanting to do a musical and when John Delorey arrived in '01 we started discussing musicals. I nearly fell off my chair when he told me he'd optioned the rights to Les Miserables. Unfortunately with all the rules and regulations on getting the rights to perform the show, it still hasn't become a viable option yet. We began the road to a musical in small steps. We started with a concert of show tunes from shows such as Oklahoma, South Pacific, and A Funny Thing Happend on the Way to the Forum amung others. John also put together a chamber group to perform Mahogany and then later a semi-staged version of Whitchwife.

Last year we began discussions of doing a full out musical with lights, sound, set, costume, props, the works. We mulled around several different shows and came up with Sweeny Todd. It was a good size show, wasn't too rangey, not too many or too few characters and could have a small chorus. Also important was that it had name recognition. The next question came as to when to have it. Formost in my mind after two years of being involved in Masque is that we didn't want this show, and hopefully future musicals, to compete with the existing framework of shows at WPI. After mulling it over we ended up going with A term as the show dates for the production. We would Audition the show in C term and then go on a mini-hiatus during New Voices so as not to compete for time and then do rehearsals before the summer and then give everyone their scripts to learn over the summer.

The rehearsal schedule was VERY aggressive when we came back. We had rehearsals nearly every day for at least 2-4 members of the cast depending on the scenes being run and for the last two and half weeks its been pretty much rehearsals every day. It was a lot of work and a lot of stress but finally it ends tonight and I'm so proud of what we accomplished. The first two nights have been INCREDIBLE. We've gotten glowing acolades from the President of the college as well as the provost for the Opening show and Susan saw the Friday performance and said that we did a wonderful job and that she enjoyed our performance.

Tonight nine years of wishing and hoping and five years of working with John have finally born fruit with the close of a very successful run of the show.