Daily Sitka Sentinel

Stars to Shine Bright at Sitka Broadway Night

By KLAS STOLPE
Sentinel Staff Writer
    “They call you Lady Luck…”
     “Start spreading the news…”
     “The costumes, the scenery, the makeup, the props…”
     “Dear God, you made many, many poor people…”
    If you recognize any of those opening lines then Broadway Night, an evening of show tunes performed by Sitka celebrities and everyday people, is right up your alley.
    “Broadway always has show tunes and a dance break,” said Broadway Night producer Shannon Haugland. “I am really excited about this year’s show.”
    It will be held Saturday, Jan. 26, at Odess Theater (Allen Hall) on the SJ campus, starting at 6:30 p.m. Doors open at 6 p.m.
    The event is a fundraiser for the Greater Sitka Arts Council’s Sitka Community Theater spring musical production, “9 to 5,” which will be directed by Sotera Perez.
    Some of the Broadway Night performers will be from the cast of that show and from last year’s community theater production of “The Addams Family Musical.”
    “We have 26 performers in the show and they can all sing,” Haugland said. “You will see a lot of new faces this year.”

Sitka Studio of Dance students kick up their heels in a chorus line performance during the 2018 Broadway Night at Odess Theater on the SJ campus. This year’s event takes place Saturday, Jan. 26. (Sentinel file photo)

    Haugland originated the first Broadway Night eight years ago with a few like-minded theater buffs who realized they didn’t have all the funds needed for an upcoming play. Even though SCT was supported by the Greater Sitka Arts Council, Haugland believed the community theater group should raise its own funds and be as self-sufficient as possible. A low-budget solution for a fundraiser was to gather local people who like to sing and a Karaoke machine.
    “We were running into all these people all over town,” she said. “Like PJ Ford Slack, John Stein, Jay Sweeney… all these people that are in public life that can also sing.”
    Now that the tradition is established, performers plan all year for their time in the spotlight, thinking up different themes, maybe adding choreography or props. The 2017 show featured an elaborate “Hamilton” piece.
    “We are getting more and more of that,” Haugland said. “This is the second year we are having a dance group perform. That has added a new element.”
    Jo DeBell, a fourth-year instructor from Sitka Studio Of Dance (she grew up dancing there for 12 years), has choreographed the 1930s Louis Prima big band classic “Sing Sing Sing” for ten of the studio’s upper -level middle and high school dancers.
    “I chose it because it’s just an instrumental,” DeBell said. “I thought that might break up the singing of the evening.”
    The piece will be incredibly stylized, she said. Her inspiration was the choreography for “Sing Sing Sing” by Tony Award winner Bob Fosse in the stage musical “Dancin’.”
    “Fosse has a lot of very distinct head and hand and body positions that we’re really trying to emulate,” she said. “It’s different from what we usually do, just a generally classic jazz… this is Fosse style. It’s really snappy for sure. Fosse has a lot of very modern ideas about the hands, he uses fists and contractions and a bent over double position you wouldn’t think is beautiful but the way that he puts it all together it is weird, it is cool and it is really interesting.”
     In the real-life Broadway production Fosse had 40 dancers making entrances and exits across the stage.
    “We do all of it at once,” DeBell said. “Plus on the Odessa stage verses a big broadway stage.”
    DeBell said the audience should look for the Fosse hands and funky movements outside a classical jazz step. Movements such as ‘the corkscrew’ (a stir-the-pot swivel action) and “sugar” (kind of like the twist, if you were twisting on both legs at once).
    “To inspire us, we watched the original Tony production of ‘Sing Sing Sing’ from 1978 and 1999,” DeBell said. “We looked at the differences and how the different choreographers and dance captains set the piece. The consistent part was the costume. If we had boys in the piece they would be in great big giant zoot suits and the girls in lovely fringe costumes. But we are just all a ladies group so it’s just the fringe for us.”
    Andrew Hames will emcee Broadway Night for the fourth consecutive year.
    “It’s always a fun night hosting,” Hames said. “It is a highlight of the year. What is great about it is even I don’t know what the whole show is going to look like. I get to announce people as they come on, I don’t see the dress rehearsals, I see it unfold right along with the audience.”
    He enjoys seeing Broadway Night veterans as well as new faces up on the stage.
    “It’s always well attended and the crowd is always into it,” he said.
    The show opens with Hames walking onto the stage and breaking into song. He said he’s still deciding on his piece will be for this show. He is looking at a tune from “Wicked,” or a classic by Rodgers & Hammerstein or Cole Potter.
    “I just try to go out and do a strong performance,” he said. “I get to break the ice for anybody that was worried about going first. Kick the show off and then start passing it around to everybody else. It is fun when people reach outside with something that is not as well known for a stage production. People just come up with creative things.”
    “I like to keep the show moving,” he said. “I don’t talk a lot. If I know a little about a performer’s song I will give a story about it, but I try to keep everyone feeling good.”
    He also will make cameos in others performances. He is working on a number with his nine-year-old daughter Morgan and his mother, Mary Hames.
    “We are still narrowing that down too,” he said. “We are going to meet this weekend and see what we can come up with. I really enjoy when families put a number together, it is fun to see people go out and put themselves out there.”
    Among the many performers in this year’s Boadway Night are Zeke Blackwell, John Stein, Keith Greinier, Rhiannon Guevin, Erin Fulton, Sarah Frank, Andy Turner, Debbie Leveck, Catherine Rose, and Jack Peterson.
    As Haugland said, “There has been so much great stuff on Broadway… and people here don’t get to see it that often. This will give people the chance to hear interesting music and see great performances.”
    And remember… when the opening drum beats of “Sing Sing Sing” sashay in to brass horns… well then,  “Stick with me, baby, I’m the fellow you came in with - Luck be a lady tonight!”
    Tickets, available at Old Harbor Books, are $40, including wine and appetizers. Doors open 6 p.m. Jan. 26, and show tunes begin 6:30 p.m.