Theatre
Medway High School is known to produce one of the area's best musical productions each spring, drawing a large audience from several surrounding communities. The school musical is a fully staged, choreographed and costumed Broadway show with full orchestra and crew.
The Medway High School musical was directed by Chris Roberts for the first time in 2010. The long-standing music director is Nadine Amaral, who has been with the production since 1993. Patricia Kennedy had directed every Medway production for over 20 years before retiring after the 2009 performance of Guys and Dolls.
Each year's show is typically cast in mid-to-late December, with rehearsals running from early January through mid March. Show dates are usually the third full week in March. Medway Cable Access videotapes one of the nights of the production, and the show is then aired on one of Medway Cable Access' Public-access television channels in the coming weeks and months. Traditionally, the curtain goes up at 7:30PM. Most performances last about two and a half hours, which includes one intermission.
The old Medway High School (current middle school) sat approximately 375 people. The show schedule for this auditorium had a dress rehearsal/senior citizen show Tuesday morning, with public performances Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings. Bye Bye Birdie was the last production staged at the old Medway High School, with the final performance on March 20, 2004.
The new Medway High School auditorium seats approximately 575 people. Because of the added seating, the production now performs four shows instead of five. The new show schedule has a dress rehearsal/senior citizen show Wednesday afternoon, with public performances Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings. On rare occasions, a Saturday matinee show is added.
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Famous quotes containing the word theatre:
“The theatre is a gross art, built in sweeps and over-emphasis. Compromise is its second name.”
—Enid Bagnold (1889–1981)
“As in a theatre the eyes of men,
After a well-graced actor leaves the stage,
Are idly bent on him that enters next,
Thinking his prattle to be tedious,
Even so, or with much more contempt, men’s eyes
Did scowl on gentle Richard.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Glorious bouquets and storms of applause ... are the trimmings which every artist naturally enjoys. But to move an audience in such a role, to hear in the applause that unmistakable note which breaks through good theatre manners and comes from the heart, is to feel that you have won through to life itself. Such pleasure does not vanish with the fall of the curtain, but becomes part of one’s own life.”
—Dame Alice Markova (b. 1910)