Cast chosen for Southeastern Opera/Music Theatre Workshop's ‘A Night on Broadway’
Friday, September 29, 2017
by: Tonya Lowentritt
BIG FINALE – Students in Southeastern Louisiana University’s Opera/Music Theatre Workshop’s
cast of “A Night on Broadway” rehearse a number prior to the Oct. 5 production at
Columbia Theatre for the Performing Arts. From left are Cheyenne Moore, Elizabeth
Langley, Deondra Bell, Vivian McCalman, Carley Duet, Alfred Harper, Kaylin Guillory,
Anne Labranche, Sara Cage, Alexandria Bowers, Provence Hatfield, Christina Duffaut,
and Hannah Turner.
HAMMOND – Southeastern Louisiana University’s Opera/Music Theatre Workshop will present
“A Night on Broadway” Thursday, Oct. 5.
Scheduled at 7:30 p.m., at the Columbia Theatre for the Performing Arts in downtown
Hammond, the performance is part of Fanfare, the university’s annual fall festival
for the arts, humanities and social sciences.
Instead of a full scale opera, explained Charles Effler, director of the Opera/Music
Theatre Workshop, this year’s presentation consists of Broadway solo songs and ensembles
set to the music of a live, on-stage orchestra.
Advance tickets are available at the Columbia Theatre box office Monday through
Friday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and will also be available one hour prior to the performance.
Ticket prices are $21 for adults; $18 for seniors, Southeastern faculty/staff and
non-Southeastern students; and $8 for children 12 and under. Southeastern students
are admitted free of charge with their university ID.
“The most exciting thing about this concert of Broadway songs is the wide variety
of shows that the songs are drawn from,” Effler said. “We have a song from an early
classic Broadway show, ‘Showboat,’ which opened in 1927, we have songs from shows
that opened in this century, and just about and everything in between! There’s something
for everybody.”
Included in the production are Broadway songs from “Sunday in the Park with George,”
“Ragtime,” “Sweeney Todd,” “The Adam’s Family,” “Carousel,” “Guys and Dolls,” “Les
Miserables,” “Gypsy,” “Catch Me If You Can,” “Man of La Mancha,” “Kiss Me Kate,” and
more.
Opera Workshop welcomes back guest stage director Alton Geno for this production.
In addition to a long career as a performer, choreographer, and director in New Orleans
and around the country, Geno directed Opera Workshop’s sold out-performances of “Sweeney
Todd,” as well as productions of “The Light in the Piazza,” “South Pacific,” “The
Wizard of Oz” and “The Music Man.”
The cast for the production includes Deondra Bell, Sara Cage and Jason Lane of
Baton Rouge; Jody Bennett of Houston; Alexandria Bowers of Ponchatoula; Carley Duet
of Cut Off; Christina Duffaut and Cheyenne Moore of Slidell; Jessica Dunlap of Walker;
Randi Gaspard and Kaylin Guillory of Covington; Alfred Harper of New Orleans; Provence
Hatfield of Amite; Jeanetta Johnson of Bogalusa; Elizabeth Langely and Vivian McConnell
of Mandeville; Anne Lebranche of Abita Springs; Wesley Newton of Bourg; Cody Sires
of Chalmette; Hannah Turner of Central; and Haylee Zeringue, Prairieville.
Effler will serve as musical director and conductor, and Department of Fine and
Performing Arts faculty member Benjamin Norman is designing the lighting.
For more information about the Opera/Music Theatre Workshop contact Effler at
ceffler@southeastern.edu.
