We attended the opening show last Thursday of “42nd Street,” performed by the Cazenovia High School Drama Club, and all we can say is: Wow. Just, wow. The acting was fantastic; the singing and dancing was superb; the costumes and stage sets were magnificent, the music performed by the live orchestra was wonderful. As one person with whom we saw the show said, the show was so well done and professional that we forgot, at times, that we were watching a high school production.
Every year we attend the spring musical, and every year the shows just seem to get better.
“42nd Street,” first produced on Broadway in 1981, depicts the glamour and excitement of Broadway and New York City, circa 1932. Essentially a show within a show, the musical tells the story of a troupe preparing to perform the show “Pretty Lady” when the leading lady gets injured and can’t go on. “42nd Street” is a show full of songs that everybody knows, such as “We’re In the Money,” “Lullaby of Broadway” and “42nd Street.”
Everything about this year’s show was excellent, but there were certain aspects to it that we would like to single out as especially impressive. Overall, the singing and dancing numbers were just astounding. It seems as though the majority of the cast learned how to tap dance just for the show (we assume, since we can’t imagine all of them just happened to have trained in tap). We were especially impressed by Jonathan Benn, who played Andy Lee, and his seemingly effortless tapping that was also imbued with a pure joy that radiated from his face; and Megan Schwartz, who played lead Peggy Sawyer, who portrayed with gusto a nervous ingénue with huge singing and dancing talent.
All of the dance ensemble numbers were likewise impressive, and we marveled at the costumes — and how quickly the actors were able to make wardrobe changes while transitioning between numbers.
On the acting side, lead Emily Mahoney, who played Dorothy Brock, was spot-on. As the veteran actress around whom the show is based, but who has an ego to match her talent, Mahoney seemed larger-than-life every time she was on stage, and perfectly transported the audience into the story. Her performances of “You’re Getting to be a Habit with Me” and “I Know Now” were especially notable. Rory Flannery, who played show producer Julian Marsh, perfectly embodied the character, and his finale performance of “42nd Street” left us with goosebumps.
Individual performances can only take a show so far, however, unless the entire cast and crew is on point — and this was an exceptional effort from top to bottom. To think that the show we saw was a high school production is simply astounding.
