Thespians to perform 'Newsies' musical

The ‘Disney’s Newsies’ musical is set to hit the stage this week.

The Green River High School theater department, with the help of Lincoln Middle School and elementary school students, will put on the performance. Performances are scheduled to take place Thursday, Friday and Monday at 7 p.m., while Saturday a performance will take place at 2 p.m. Tickets are available at the website http://www.showtix4u.com.

Newsies is based on a 1992 musical film, which was inspired by a real-life newsboy strike of 1899 in New York City. Music director Jill Carpenter said the Newsies were nine and 10 year olds.

At the time only 11 percent of the U.S. population had completed a high-school education.

For some families, children worked to help support the family because school was not mandatory.

“Two years ago, we challenged our students to improve their musicality and picked a show, ‘School of Rock,’ which required students to play instruments on stage while singing.

Last year, we wanted to focus on emotional and vocal range and did so with the musical ‘Bright Star,’” GRHS director Bradlee Skinner said.

“This year, we wanted to challenge our students with improving their dancing ability. ‘NEWSIES’ is a dance heavy production and we have seen our students raise to the challenge and we are excited for the community to see the result of their hard work.”

Skinner said this family-friendly show is appropriate for all ages and includes a lot of fun songs that will make the audience root for the underdog.

“Audiences can expect to see our Green River kids doing extraordinary things,” Carpenter said.

“This is a couple of steps beyond a school concert or Christmas program and even a high school play. You can also see student generated ideas coming to life.  And of course, there’s singing, dancing, acrobatics and acting going on.”

It will take a cast and crew of 75 to put on a musical of this size. Skinner said auditions took place the second week of school and they began dance rehearsals on the third week of school.

It’s a lot of extra work and requires more patience, but Skinner said it’s all worth it to see fourth and fifth-grade students dancing and singing on stage.

Assistant director Jessica Hodges said they have had many challenges doing a large Disney show like this one.

“Our cast size is huge, so we have relied on everyone to help things run smoothly. This show is very demanding for named roles,” Hodges said. “Most need to be proficient at speaking with an accent, singing and dancing.”

“Because this show is based off of historical events, the students were able to do a lot of character research. Some of the characters in the show are even based off of real people,” Sarah Robles, assistant choreographer and tap dance instructor, said.

“In the first few weeks of the show the students did research on the year of 1899 and learned about the child labor unions that were formed. Along with developing a character, several students were able to expand their music knowledge and also their ability to dance. This show has a lot of dancing and it has been so great to see the students become not only good singers, but dancers.”

Including middle school and elementary school is a way to spark an interest in the theater at a younger age.

“Teaching the love of theater and the arts to our younger students builds our program for years to come,” Skinner said.

“We want the next generation of theater performers and theater goers to love the arts. Even if they do not continue to pursue theater in high school we hope they continue to enjoy watching theater for the rest of their lives.”

He said with this particular performance, the younger students are involved in many scenes, whereas in previous plays or musicals, they were only involved in a single scene.

Hodges said the show wouldn’t get done without the help from volunteers.

“I would also say that costumes for this production have been challenging,” she said.

“It is difficult enough to find costumes for a cast of 80, but our amazing costume designer, Charla Harris, has put together stunning, period-appropriate ensembles.” 

“We are so fortunate to have a supportive community with families willing to share their students’ time and talents with us to improve our show and help us build for the future,” Skinner said.