Backblog – Wednesday, April 29th
The theater fun continued on this Wednesday. I have a bias since I work there, but I think CVCA has a kick-butt theater program. I have been very impressed with the theater productions in general, but especially the spring musicals. The musical pulls together a pit orchestra, a cast of 30 or more, a set crew and tech crew and costume crew, and in all attracts the talents of about 100 students. It really is amazing, especially for a high school.
This year’s production was Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. While this may not be everyone’s cup of tea (in Chip, of course), the kids were really excited. I had not seen the animated movie in a long time, so while I knew the story, I had forgotten many of the particulars.
The set was fantastic, with three layers. The farthest back was the Beast’s castle, and it had two levels – an upstairs where the Beast’s library and rose were, and a lower level where most of the action happened. This allowed for some pretty dramatic entrances by the Beast, and forced him to be pretty physical. The lower level also had a dungeon door where Belle’s father was imprisoned (and included a door that the Beast could rip off the hinges while enraged).
There was also a mid-stage curtain that could be drawn across the stage that had a creepy forest painted on it for the scenes where Belle’s father (and later Belle) are attacked by wolves. The wolves were really neat. They were ensemble actors dressed as wolves who had well-choreographed dances and moves while attacking. They were very effective, and exited through the audience, which was a nice touch.
The front of the stage had mobile scenery that was often made up of the town that Belle lived in, and was home to the wonderfully chauvinistic Gaston. It included several building facades, a town well or platform (Gaston stood on it during one song), and two thrust stages on either side of the main stage for Belle’s garden and other smaller scenes. The scenery was not the stereotypical cardboard cutout falling over at the back of the stage!
The costuming was fantastic. All of the costumes were rented, so the costumes were pretty much what professional theaters use. The magical people/objects found in the Beast’s castle were much fun, with the costumes often being more suggestive of the object and sometimes more literal. The magic chest of drawers was a full costume including one drawer that opened up, while Lumiere (the candle) was mostly suggested by two flames that covered the hands.
Ahh, and the special effects. I don’t often think of special effects for high school productions, but this one had some doozies. There was Chip – the little boy who had turned into a teacup. He was wheeled in on a tea cart, and all you could see was his head. The cart was open, so it certainly looked as if there was no body below the head in the teacup. It worked really well (it was done by carefully constructed mirrors, and was apparently very cramped inside). There was Belle’s father’s invention – a machine that chopped wood. The character dropped a whole piece of wood inside his cart, and several split pieces fell out immediately. This was done with springs and a trap door, and was also very convincing. The Beast’s final transformation back into a human was a closely guarded secret, and it involved a huge rush of dry ice that immediately covered the back of the stage in a fog. It was very impressive.
The big central number, “Be Our Guest,” was amazing. It involved at least 30 people dancing on stage, and included hundreds of lights that burst on the stage in the middle of the song. It was pretty jaw-dropping.
The music was very fine. It turns out that the score for Beauty and the Beast is actually very difficult. Many of the pieces are very fast, and there is music through almost the entire play (at least as background music). The kids did a great job, and I was pleased to be sitting right next to the pit so I could see how they were doing. The singing was excellent – CVCA has a massive amount of singing talent, possibly a nice result of the students’ singing in church every Sunday for 15 years.
Mer and I both thoroughly enjoyed the evening. The kids did a great job, and there is a special treat of being “in the know” when watching a production: knowing the actors, crew, musicians, and directors adds a level of fun that makes the evening special.