Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious will be the word to look out for at Cherokee High School, when on May 15, the Cherokee Drama Guild debuts its spring musical “Mary Poppins.”
With theatrical rights to the Broadway show having just been released in November, many schools across the nation have decided to down a spoonful of sugar and attempt to bring the show’s iconic characters to a high school stage for the first time.
Play director and Cherokee High School teacher Joe Fisicaro Jr. said the show has so many moving parts, dance sequences, lighting and sound effects, and other production aspects, even including Mary Poppins and jack-of-all-trades Bert flying across the stage, that the show is one of, if not the, most difficult production he’s ever been involved with at the school.
However, despite that difficulty, Fisicaro said this year’s cast of students has met every challenge.
“They never laid back, they never relaxed, and they just kept pushing and pushing and pushing,” Fisicaro said. “This group really works well. This group works better than I could have ever dreamed of for this program.”
Even Mary Poppins herself, senior Melanie Ashe, with all her magical whimsy, still echoed Fisicaro’s sentiments about the difficulty of the production.
“It’s not just about the dancing and singing and acting,” Ashe said. “There’s flying and there’s a thousand different parts to each dance and each ensemble.”
However, Ashe said starring in the school’s first production of Mary Poppins as the show’s titular character in her senior year has been an “insane” journey.
“This has definitely been the greatest experience of my life so far, the most fun role I’ve played I think,” Ashe said.
Another challenge noted by several members of the cast is the difficulty of portraying such an iconic and memorable character so many members of the public already know and love.
“Even though they are very iconic, you can still bring something fresh and new the audience hasn’t seen,” said sophomore Alyssa Biederman, who has one of the production’s two roles of Jane Banks. “If they wanted to see the iconic characters, they could watch the movie, so when you come to Cherokee, you can really see a new side to characters you already love.”
Senior Darrin Murphy, playing the role of Bert made most famous by comedic actor Dick Van Dyke in Disney’s 1964 film, agreed with Biederman.
“To get to play the role, especially after Dick Van Dyke played that, because he’s just always had amazing roles — I just try to see what he does with it and sort of add my own twist to it so I can make Bert my own sort of character,” he said.
Senior Caitlin Ablaza, in the role of Mrs. Winifred Banks, said seeing the cast uphold the legacy of those characters, tough as it may be, is why she thinks members of the public should come out and see the students perform.
“We’re very good at what we do,” Ablaza said. “Cherokee theater has an amazing image, and we as a cast are honored to uphold that image to its high standard, and they (audience members) will have a lot of fun.”
In addition to members of the public getting to see iconic characters they know and love, senior Michael Lazarus, playing George Banks, said those who attend the show will get to see things not in the film version they may be most familiar with.
“What I think is really interesting about the play version versus the movie is that there’s so many different aspects of Mary Poppins that we get to see, and even songs that I’m sure a lot of people hadn’t heard of before that are in the play that they weren’t exposed to in the movie, and it’s really great stuff.”
Cherokee High School’s production of “Mary Poppins” debuts on May 15, and will also run on May 16, May 22 and May 23 at the Lenape Regional Performing Arts Center, located at 130 Tomlinson Mill Road.
All shows start at 7:30 p.m., and tickets will cost $10 for students and seniors and $12 for adults.
Tickets are available at the door on the night of the performance, by phone at (856) 983–3366, or online at www.cherokeedrama.org.
