A cast of 50 people and a tech crew of 25 people are producing “Anything Goes” unlike the smaller productions in the past. Although in previous years they preferred to produce emotionally heavier and smaller musicals such as “Into the Woods” and “Little Women,” this year they chose a musical with more movement and liveliness.
“‘Anything Goes’ is a very, very light and funny musical,” theater teacher Andrew Shaw said. “Big cast, lots of ensemble roles, lots of opportunities for people on stage and lots of dancing which we haven’t had for the past couple of years.”
The musical follows the protagonist Billy Crocker as he tries to find the love of his life on a cruise ship to London and finds himself stuck in a love square. “Anything Goes,” which was popular during the golden age of musical theater, consists of many different characters coming together, and will be the second biggest Broadway musical at the school since 2017.
“I want everyone to know how entertaining the story is,” freshman Meghan Bernet, one of the background characters, said. “It’s not really a traditional story, and I think there are a lot of special aspects of the show.”
For “Anything Goes,” there is a cast of 50 people and a tech crew of 25 people. The tech staff is required to attend their rehearsals, to practice controlling the lights, microphones, music, and etc. After school and on some weekends, tech staff and cast members stay at school and practice controlling the lights, music and dances together.
“Our student techs are amazing and awesome,” Shaw said. “This is a program that we’ve been growing. We have students who design all of the lights and we have students who will take care of all the microphones, sound and programming the board. They are able to use all of the tools that are in the shop and put the set together.”
Students who are a part of such productions have to balance both their schoolwork and the musical in order to maintain their grades and memorize their lines. Keeping this balance can sometimes be challenging, especially during tech weeks, where they have seven hour rehearsals almost every day. Assistant director senior Rory Ketzle is used to the challenge of long rehearsals, especially during tech weeks.
“After you’ve been doing theater for a while, you learn how to balance it,” Ketzle said. “You can find time during rehearsals to work on schoolwork or you take time during the school day to rehearse. But the theater really acts as a big lesson on how to manage your time and how to be efficient.”
Sam Wolff performs a tap dance to the cast during rehearsals. (Asmin Cakir)
A large-scale musical like “Anything Goes” will feature some elaborate dances. Several dance groups will complete a tap performance, which will run from start to finish for a total of six minutes. These choreographies were presented by numerous dance groups at tap calls.
The show will be performed from April 18 through 21, with the shows on April 18, 19 and 20 at 7pm and the show on April 21 at 2 p.m. The tickets cost $17 for adults and $10 for students which can be bought from Etix.
“There is actually so much work going into the play that we spent upwards of 25-30 hours a week working on this,” Ketzle said. “So it’s a huge commitment that people have really been excited for.”
