Mary Poppins
Who doesn’t like Mary Poppins? Well....me. I’ve never been a fan of the movie. I think I never found amusement in animated penguins dancing with real people, or maybe it was that the bird woman just creeped me out. I don’t know, but it just didn’t work for me--other than "Step In Time" which I have been looking forward to choreographing since I saw it on stage at the Ordway several years ago.
So why devote six months of my creative time working on a show that I wasn’t thoroughly excited about?
Well here’s the thing, other people LOVE it, and I can appreciate the quality of writing even if I'm not enamored with the show itself. Play Inc. is here to present shows that challenge or entertain our audiences and performers, and Mary Poppins entertains quite well, but its challenges are the kind I love to tackle as a director working with the best creative team out there. There are all the stage magic bits--that I'm not good at personally, but our set designer Angie Gregerson is. There is tons of music seamlessly integrated with dialogue that takes real masters of timing which we are fortunate to have in Shannon Shogren, Crystal Kennedy, the pit musicians, and our wonderful leads. You will see a ton of technical needs all overseen by Stage Manager Viva Anderson. Of course there are the extended 6-8 minute dance sequences--and I never know how the adults are going to respond to some of the things I ask them to do. And last there is the challenge of coordinating about 30 set changes choreographed to music, but only getting to rehearse them 4 times before an audience comes in (such is the way of life for a homeless theatre company).
We hope you are entertained by this work as much as we have been challenged by it.
Play Inc Perspectives: The First Year of Play Inc Arts
Just about one year ago, I was writing program notes for Beauty and the Beast. In those notes, I detailed the new endeavor of how Play Inc Arts was born out of the old Play Inc Community Theatre and Cambridge Center for the Arts.
After one year, I’m proud to say that Play Inc. Arts is doing extremely well and we are excited to get to work on our 15th theatrical season. The year started with what could only be called one of the most humbling (in a good way) directing experiences that I’ve had. The outpouring of responses that followed our production of Beauty and the Beast (as well as the 2500 tickets that were sold) was overwhelming. We were so proud of that production, that matching it was going to be a a huge challenge (as detailed above).
The rest of the 2018 continued with great success. Singing in the Rain, Jr. was one of our most polished middle school productions, and Godspell was a moving and joyful production that I still get compliments on.
In and amongst that Play Inc has continued to find ways to grow and develop new opportunities. We hope you’re here with us for all of those. Our 15th season will bring more popular favorites to our stage. Our company will present, Broadway’s second longest running musical (longest revival, and longest running American musical), Chicago, Broadway’s third longest running musical, The Lion King (jr. performed by our middle schoolers), and Broadway’s fifth longest running musical and Cambridge audience favorite, Les Miserables. On Broadway they have amassed over 25,000 performances. Be sure to catch one (or more) of the 11 that we’ll offer.
