The comedy troupe known as the Clinton High School Music Department pulled off an amazing musical last week.
Or is it that the Music Department performed a comedy?
Whatever name they go by, the crew did a wonderful job with "The Drowsy Chaperone" as this year’s musical.
The premise is that the narrator, played so well by Esme Davis, loves musicals. On this day the narrator puts on the double record set of ‘The Drowsy Chaperone.’
During the musical the narrator fills the audience in on both plot of the musical and backstory of who the actors were in the original musical.
And of course, this is all taking place on stage as a musical.
Whenever the narrator speaks, the actors on stage freeze in place.
They all did that with great stillness, with a special nod to Marley Scholefield, who kept a Swan Lake pose during the narrator’s comments.
But stillness is only part of the comedy. It’s a musical on the move.
Gracen Grimm, as Mrs. Tottendale, goes through a series of spit takes while drinking ice water. Or vodka.
Grimm sprayed and sprayed and didn’t break character despite the distraction of a laughing audience.
John Musante, known only as the Underling ( butler), also somehow kept from joining in the laughter.
Their “Love is Always Lovely’ was a sweet duet.
Phoenix Townsend played Janet Van De Graaff, a woman about to get married and give up the glamour of the stage.
Of course in the number ‘Show Off ’ Janet shows with her encore this won’t be so easy for her despite what she says.
Townsend and the Drowsy Chaperone, played by Nora Reid, unleashed voices on the stage on par with their take- charge characters.
Reid kept up a delightful show of not quite understanding what’s going on, quite possibly having to do with the cause of her drowsiness, a silver flask she visited often.
Mac Spadea as Robert, the groom about to end Janet’s ...
Comments