WTHS brings musical to the stage March 8 to 10
While some students head home after the end of the school day at Washington Township High School, others are working vigorously in the school’s auditorium to prepare for the upcoming spring musical — putting in hours of practice, six days a week.
This year, students will be performing their version of the 2014 Disney film, “Into the Woods,” a show that has proven to be no easy feat for students, according to vocal director Joseph Zachowski.
“They do their absolute best, because they know in order to pull off a show like this, you have to rehearse it a certain way,” Zachowski said. “And, they’re doing a great job with it.”
“This is a very difficult show to do as a high school, and we picked it this year for a couple of reasons. One, we knew we had the level of talent to do it. We knew the kids were going to do it amazingly,” Zachowski continued. “This show features a lot of characters, and there’s a ton of parts, and so we wanted to give more kids the opportunity to be featured and be highlighted.”
Zachowski noted the work of composer Stephen Sondheim would prove to be challenging, but the students have been more than committed to the rehearsals. “Sondheim, who wrote the show, he’s a brilliant lyricist — his rhyme scheme, the way he writes in terms of meter and beat and accents,” Zachowski said. ”It’s incredibly complex.”
The community is invited to attend the shows, which will be held at WTHS, from Thursday, March 8 through Saturday, March 10.
“The audience is going to walk in very familiar with the stories — the traditional way of telling these stories — but what they can expect is a completely different take on what happens behind the scenes,” Zachowksy said. “It kind of takes a lot of the fairy tales that we all know and love, but you see a completely different side of it. It takes you in a completely different direction.”
The show depicts characters from various Disney fairy tales — but with a twist. According to director Abigail Molotsky, it starts off with the fairy tale characters and progressively gets darker, exemplifying how things aren’t always “happily ever after.”
“You see this struggle for family, and struggle for belonging, and what it means to be a child and have to grow up — and that’s kind of the beauty of the whole thing. The youth and innocence, and how that’s corrupted — that’s the way I see it,” said senior Alexa Liss, who has been involved with the spring musical since her freshman year. “It could be taken a lot of different ways.”
Liss also noted the show is much different from ones they’ve done in the past.
“It’s just so cool to see everyone do something so different — we did ‘Grease,’ then we did ‘In the Heights,’ and now it’s ‘Into the Woods,’” Liss said. “It’s just such a contrast between the three shows.”
“‘Into the Woods’ is different than, honestly, any other show in my opinion,” Liss continued. “There’s a ton of music, and it’s very fast — very challenging — but it all helps to communicate the story. It is a mix of a lot of fairy tales, but it’s kind of more of the dark side of everything.”
Liss, who will play the Witch, said the audience will enjoy how the show is constantly in motion. Additionally, Molotsky incorporated conceptual elements through the use of large picture frame props. Molotsky also noted there will be visual artwork displayed in the show, all created by two portrait artists — large five-foot by three-foot portraits of the cast members.
According to Molotsky, there are 44 cast members, 12 stage managers and production assistants, seven kids working with props, 20 stage crew members, 15 adults and students combined working in the pit, and four lighting and sound kids who make up the musical.
“They’re just very talented kids, and we’re very lucky,” Molotsky said. “There are 19 leads in the show, and they’re all amazing.”
Molotsky also credited Zachowski’s vocal training abilities.
“This is really, really hard stuff. It’s hard to dance to, and it’s really hard to sing. There’s intricate melodies and harmonies. But, they’re so well trained by Joe,” Molotsky added.
“We’ve been rehearsing since [the] beginning of January — working with both ensemble rehearsals and lead character rehearsals,” Zachowski continued. “One of the different things about this show, in comparison to a lot of shows, is there’s pretty much music the entire time. And so, being able to line up not just the singing with the music — but the timing of the lines, and the changes and transitions — it’s pretty much all over top of music except for some parts. So, that has made for some different challenges in putting the show together.”
Both Molotsky and Zachowski urge the community to come out and support the show and the students.
“I think our community will be impressed with them vocally, they’re going to be impressed with their acting, it’s going to look great, it’s going to sound great — but even taking away some of those elements [and] looking at the big picture, and the lessons and the morals — I think seeing kids portray these things at a very deep level and really get into it seriously, I think will be very, very powerful,” Zachowski explained.
“They should come and see these kids — in their community — do this unbelievable thing,” Molotsky said. “They should support the arts in their community.”
The show will be held at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 8 and Friday, March 9, and at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 10. Tickets will be $10.
To purchase tickets and reserve seating, visit https://wthsnj.booktix.com/. Online ordering will close two hours before the show, and any remaining seats can be purchased at the box office the night of the show.
