Sinclair students will be performing their first-ever all student-run production, bare: A Pop Opera, debuting Thursday, Nov. 13.
\nBare is a rock musical by Jon Hartmere, Jr. and Damon Intrabartolo, with lyrics by Hartmere and music by Intrabartolo. The musical\u2019s first production took place at the Hudson Theatre in Los Angeles, California, running from October 2000 to February 2001. The New York production of Bare on American Theatre of Actors off-Broadway, was performed from April to May 2004.
\n\u201cBare is the first musical completely ran by students to take place at Sinclair,\u201d Natalie Sanders (who plays Ivy) informed. \u201cIt\u2019s definitely a different direction.\u201d
\nDirector Chris Harmon and music director David Mckibben oversees the production giving guidance and education to the 17-person cast. Lighting, stage set-up and costumes are all student-designed.
\nThe story of bare is set in the present and focuses on two gay teens and their experiences at a Catholic boarding school. Underlying issues of drug use, body-image concerns and teen pregnancy are also interwoven into the plot of the student musical.
\nThe rehearsals take place four days a week at the newly renovated Black Box theatre across from the Green room in building 2.
\nTo make the production different from many other shows Chris Harmon is allowing this production to be exactly what it is, a student-run musical. Keeping a keen eye, Harmon watched on as the actors played before him.
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\n\u201cDifferent lighting, set design helps everyone brings something different to the table to make a performance unique,\u201d he said. \u201cThey have so many great ideas if you let them be independent, but still keep with a vision.\u201d Mckibben leads the musical instruction with intense, passionate direction, while helping guide the many voice into rising and lowering waves of depth and tone. With each break and piece of advice, along with encouragement, the cast begins singing in divine unison.
\n\u201cThis performance is especially challenging since the entire play is singing,\u201d Mckibeen said while listening to the performers before him. \u201cYou can tell this cast is practicing outside of rehearsals and coming in prepared every time.
\n\u201d AJ Breslin, a straight actor, plays Peter, one of the gay characters of the show. When asked if it\u2019s hard to go from being a straight man to playing a gay role, AJ replied.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s all a part of acting\u2014I portray the same feelings I have for my girlfriend when playing the role.\u201d As he looked back at his girlfriend, who plays his rival in love on stage, he added, \u201cLove is universal.\u201d
\nWhen asked if a show about the conflicts of gays in school is still relevant today, Breslin answered, \u201cUnfortunately, yes. I don\u2019t know if it should be, but the more tragic scenes are still very prevalent especially in more conservative areas.\u201d
\nBreslin worked alongside many gay students to bring to life to production, stated, \u201cThey aren\u2019t just a \u2018gay\u2019 community to me, they are part of my community.\u201d
\nAs rehearsal and music instruction begins, the actors expand to fill the Black Box Theater, incorporating all of the space in their practice of voice projection.
\n\u201cThis is my first bigger role,\u201d Anna Sheldon, who plays the fiery and passionate Nadia, said. \u201cI have sass similar to Nadia, which she uses as a defense mechanism. I can definitely recognize and identify with that.\u201d
\nSheldon said theatre is all about storytelling and connecting to a bigger realm. Marissa Childress, the lighting designer and winner of a Daytony Award of Excellence for her lighting work in Expecting Isabel, is finding her skills tested for this production that incorporates not only mood lighting but flashing lights and dramatic appearance to match the rock music.
\n\u201cCorrect lighting is pure emotion, powerful, and the last puzzle piece to any show,\u201d Childress said. Playing a character that struggles with his sexuality and how it fits in with his religious beliefs is a role that takes a lot of ability and charisma.
\nHe noted while walking off stage, \u201cThis performance doesn\u2019t slam religion, it slams intolerance.\u201d
\nBare: A Pop Opera performances are on Thursday, Nov. 13 at 7:00 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, Nov. 14 and 15 at 8:00 p.m. General admission tickets cost $15. <\/p>\n
Jamez Duty<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sinclair students will be performing their first-ever all student-run production, bare: A Pop Opera, debuting Thursday, Nov. 13. Bare is a rock musical by Jon Hartmere, Jr. and Damon Intrabartolo, with lyrics by Hartmere and music by Intrabartolo. The musical\u2019s first production took place at the Hudson Theatre in Los Angeles, California, running from October […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tartan-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5s3vR-2Kk","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10560"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10561,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10560\/revisions\/10561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}