On Thursday, January 23, the Jesuit Theater department held its auditions for the upcoming spring productions. With more than sixty students, from Jesuit, Ursuline, Booker T. Washington, Episcopal, Bishop Lynch, and Hockaday, the audition indicated many actors are eager to be a part of the productions.
This year, Mr. David Myers, head of the theater program, has decided to cast a group to make the first spring narrative film, which he’s calling “The Varsity Show.” In addition to the film, Mr. Max von Schlehenried is directing the second-annual musical revue, a performance that combines musical numbers from a number of different shows. Mr. Christopher Patterson and Mr. Joe Howard put together two casts for the spring stage comedy, “Black Comedy.”
This year’s spring film couldn’t be possible without the new Mac-based video lab. The lab allows Mr. Myers and the rest of the Theater department to modernize. It consists of professional-quality cameras and great light kits to shoot the film. Mr. Myers describes it as a series of short narratives, comedic pieces. They will be strung together in the same way that Portlandia television episodes are put together. (click here to learn more about the video lab)
For the spring musical revue, Mr. von Schlehenried has not decided on all the music yet because the revue is a workshop experience that ebbs and flows. It definitely will include music from Rent, and he is considering some Sondheim tunes (the man who wrote Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street), other contemporary musical theater, Les Misérables, and more. He said, “A lot of it’s actually a surprise…. so we hope people will come see it and be pleasantly surprised.”
Mr. Myers believes that the combination of the three shows: the classic stage comedy, the film, and the musical segment, “will give our students a wide breadth of experience in performance.” Mr. Myers also said he is very excited aboutr the upcoming composite shows that will combine live-performance, film, and musical performances all on the same evening, for the same crowds.
