Because of a large cast with multiple roles, comedy, great music and dance numbers, Cole Porter’s “Anything Goes” will be a hit, said its director, John McGee, whose daughter Caitlin graduated from this school in 2006.
“Everyone has a job,” McGee said.
“There are 51 actors, one stage director, stage and assistant stage managers, choreographers, dance captains, musicians, producers, designers, and crews for set building, costumes, props, makeup, lighting, tickets, sound, publicity and props.”
This year’s all-school musical goes on stage in Lasker Auditorium Thursday, March 19 through Saturday, March 21 at 7:30 and Sunday, March 22 at 2.
McGee said that he has acted, directed, choreographed and stage-managed in about 60 musicals.
He directed 15 musicals in the Boston area, stage managed “Nunsense” at the Charles Playhouse and toured with the New York production of “A Chorus Line.”
Through “Anything Goes,” which débuted in 1934, McGee said, he hopes for the audience to understand the changing times during the 1930s.
Plot
The story takes place about five years after the stock market crash of 1929 on a transatlantic ocean liner traveling from New York City to England, McGee said.
“‘Anything Goes’ tells everyone to take a chance and fall in love again, to get out of the bleak outlook,” he said.
“Better times were ahead. There was “A New Deal” for everyone, as the new president, Franklin Roosevelt, told the nation.”
As the story goes, Billy Crocker, a poor young Wall Street clerk played by junior Ryan Vona, meets and falls in love with Hope Harcourt, a beautiful New York débutante played by sophomore Nuala O’Donovan.
Having illegally boarded the ship to win Hope from her fiancé, the wealthy Englishman Lord Evelyn Oakleigh, played by freshman Graham Techler, Billy takes on disguises to keep his identity a secret.
One of the main issues of the play is about class, McGee said. Billy is poor, and Hope’s mother, played by Miriam Raffeld, wants Hope to marry for social position and money.
Characters
Through his “high energy, can-do attitude and willingness to be thrown in jail for the love of his life,” Billy personifies some of this country’s virtues, McGee said.
According to Vona, Billy’s conflict is to hide his identity from everyone.
“He has to hide from the ship’s crew and from his boss, but in hiding himself he lets down Hope,” Vona said. “She sees him as nothing but a clown because of all the disguises.
“Billy must make the ultimate decision of which is more important: saving himself by keeping his identity a secret, or saving Hope’s respect for him.”
Vona, who has to work with six different accents and disguises during the show, said he enjoys every rehearsal.
“You do not have to dig too deep to find the fun in the role,” he said.
Also on board is Billy’s old friend, the sassy and independent nightclub singer Reno Sweeney, played by junior Hayley Travers.
She and the gangster Moonface Martin, played by sophomore Edan Laniado, help Billy pursue Hope.
“My character is basically the mediator of the group,” Travers said. “She’s sarcastic, but she helps people.”
In one scene, for instance, Reno says that everybody has flaws while justifying Billy’s mistakes.
“Although Reno seems like the typical Hollywood starlet, she is sweet and down to earth,” Travers said. ”Despite the fact that she is looking for love and evenually finds it, she does not need a man.”
Travers said that participating in tap dance for the show is both exciting and challenging.
“Tap dancing takes a lot of stamina,” she said. “It’s very rhythmic because you have to be aware of everyone on stage and tap in sync.”
Music
The show will be a great welding of music and plot, according to music director Richard Travers, Hayley’s father.
For example, “You’re The Top,” a song that mentions Arrow collars and the playwright Eugene O’Neill is like a capsule of the 1930s, he said.
In sequence, other songs include “It’s Delovely,” “I Get a Kick Out of You,” “Anything Goes,” “Let’s Misbehave,” “All Through the Night” and “Take Me Back to Manhattan.”
“In the 1930s, story lines were concocted around the songs,” he said. “Story lines were very loose because songs for the show were written first.”
Musicians including Frank Sinatra even made their own versions of this show’s songs, he said.
“The songs all have catchy melodies as well as timely and topical lyrics in respect to the 1930s,” he said. “A lot of jazz singers used these songs to express themselves.”
Choreography by Kirsten McKinney, an instructor at Walnut Hill in Natick and director of this school’s 2006 production of “Chicago,” will highlight the music, he said, calling it “out of this world.”
The set and lights designed by seniors Kristoff Janezic and Phoebe DeGroot will depict the front view of the ship, the USS American, McGee said.
Costumes designed by senior Jazzy Pullen-Schmidt will be in style with the period.
Tickets now available after school, during lunches, at Cabot’s and online at www.theatreink.net for $12, $14 and $16 depending on seating.
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