A musical takes a lot of moving parts together to make everything work. Some shows could take as little as one month while others could take up to four. The Falcon Player’s production of Tuck Everlasting began rehearsals just before winter break. Over the past two months, the cast, crew, and creative teams have been working hard to put this show together in time for show week.
Senior Courtney Lampen, who is a stage manager on the show, described how she has learned more about musicals through working on Tuck Everlasting.
“[Stage managing] has been a little stressful since I’m used to doing plays as an actor and the musical side is new to me. I’m learning multiple things about musicals in general,” Lampen said.
As head of the costume crew, junior Mary Corkery holds an important position in the show. She explained how she enjoys being a driving part of the final product of the show.
“I think that [in] costumes, you really get the opportunity to help bring the show together and fully transform the actors into their characters, especially from an audience point of view. It’s really fun to take into account a lot of other factors to really bring their characters to life,” Corkery said.
Choir director Claire Minnis is ecstatic to be working on her second musical. She claims that the best part about music directing the shows is getting to work alongside students.
“My absolute favorite thing about serving as Music Director for the musicals at Summit is working with my incredible choir students in a new style of singing, and meeting lots of new faces! We all get to have so much fun together while pushing ourselves to do something that challenges us,” Minnis said.
The two main components of a musical are the actors and the crew. Throughout the process of rehearsals, these parts never come together until tech week (the week before the show). Lampen explained how as a stage manager, she finds it fun to see all these pieces fit with each other.
“I like seeing how each part is created as itself and then it comes all together in the end. It’s like this ‘in awe’ moment because you see everything as one and it’s really cool,” Lampen said.
Director Lyndal Willis has put on many shows at Summit. She described how the hardest part of putting on a musical is when every part comes together.
“There are a lot of things that are difficult when producing a musical because there are so many moving parts, but those difficulties are expected. As far as shows go, this one has been relatively easy to produce,” Willis said.
Last year, the school put on Once Upon a Mattress. Minnis explained how the different styles of music would be appealing to audiences.
“Tuck [Everlasting] is a newer show, which means the music is written in a more contemporary way. I really love the music in this show – lots of different students and community members would enjoy the songs in this one,” Minnis said.
