Jacob Fuentes also contributed to this article.
After two months full of memorization, vocal training, and acrobatic practice, Malden High School’s Play-Pro cast, led by Todd Cole and various staff members such as Technical Director Ariana Messana and Band Director Lauren Foley, was ready to perform “Pippin”: a story full of love, betrayal, and discovery of self-identity.
On November 22, 2024, students and their families gathered in the Jenkins Auditorium as they prepared to witness the result of all the hard work the Play-Pro cast has been putting into this show for the past two months. The show started with “Magic to Do”, the song in which the narrator Leading Player (senior Natalie Keating) introduces herself and her circus ensemble. Keating has performed in 21 shows to date, with this being her last musical performance with Malden High School’s Play Production.
Throughout this number, the circus sings to the audience and claims they have “magic to do just for you. We’ve got miracle plays to play. We’ve got parts to perform, hearts to warm, kings, and things to take by storm as we go along.” This number sets the stage for how the story of Pippin will be told. At the end of the opening number, the Leading Player is joined by her ensemble as they pose and are surrounded by roaring applause from the audience.
This play goes over the complexities of love, emotion, and identity in which the main character Pippin undergoes adversity to find who he truly is.
The play starts with an introduction of Pippin played by Heitor Soares and then introduces his stepmother Fastrada who was played by Sophie Leblanc, his protege brother Lewis who is a talented, ideal warrior played by Matt Jason Chan, his father King Charlemagne played by Liam Gallagher and Catherine played by Addison McWayne. The play slowly progresses with Pippin’s character development as he finds out that his father’s plans to convert everyone to Christianity through bloodshed and killing, this builds up the climax, and then the plot reaches a turning point as Pippin realizes that what his father is doing is wrong which ultimately leads him to kill his father and taking the throne for himself in hopes to do what’s right.
“I love performing more than anything else in the world. I don’t get stage fright anymore; in fact, being on stage in front of an audience makes me feel really confident and comfortable,” described Keating. “I love being able to connect with an audience.”
Keating posed as a character who was essentially the puppeteer of the cast. “I consider Leading Player to be very androgynous, as the role has been played by both men and women on Broadway. They are a bit of a perfectionist and are very comfortable being in control. They are manipulative and intelligent and everything they do is highly scripted and choreographed, down to every step they take,” she stated.
Other prominent characters such as Lewis, King Charlemagne, and Catherine were impressively played by cast members which helped lead up the play to give it the class and talent it needed from beginning to end.
Play Production President Addison McWayne plays Catherine, Pippin’s star-crossed lover, in which she serenades him with the tune “I Guess I’ll Miss the Man” by Rachel Bay Jones.
“Catherine is a widow that Pippin falls in love with. She is a caring and quirky character who goes against what the Leading Player wants because she falls in love with Pippin as the show goes on.” McWayne explained.
Everything happened for a reason in this show and I loved every part of it. Even little mistakes we all made, made our show more our own and we will have found mess-ups to look back on.
Addison McWayne
“It went even better than I expected. We have been working on this show for a long time but because our class periods are shorter than we would like it’s hard to fit everything into rehearsal. When we first got to tech week we had a bunch of these pieces and we were struggling to put them all together,” McWayne described while tech week, the final week of preparation before opening night, is always stressful, McWayne was proud to see the cast take it with stride: “It only took a few rehearsals to get the show on its feet but it turned out even better than I could’ve imagined. Everything down to who loves which stool on and off stage was planned and executed perfectly.”
“I am genuinely so proud of every person on that stage and behind it because we all worked so hard for this and it shows,” conveyed McWayne.
Soares shared similar words about the show. While he had positive thoughts about the show itself, he also included how the audience impacted his performance, “It’s always nice to see the turnout especially when it was an amazing turnout like we got for both nights. It makes me feel nervous when I see people I know in the crowd.” Soares also reflected that this was his last musical with the Play Production team, “It was the best two nights of my life and still was very upsetting at the same time. It’s my very last musical and it hit closing night”.
Although the cast and the stage were the most illuminating aspects of the show, the music, technicalities, and extras/understudies are also worthy of mention.
Sean Retotal, who was in the orchestra, helped with the musical choreography which helped set the mood and tone of the play.
“The process was pretty similar to learning any other piece of music I’ve had to learn in the past but it was semi-overwhelming with trying to learn new instruments I’m not really confident with,” he described. Retotal consistently practiced up until opening night: ”As the show came closer I had a lot of help from the other musicians in the orchestra as well. …My main goal was to support the actors as much as I could from where I was,” he concluded.
Kail Boswell, who posed as an understudy of Pippin, also wowed the audience with his impressive skills on the unicycle. His roles in the show included ensemble, understudy, and the talking head of a deceased soldier. “For the head’s purpose in the musical, he was essentially a plot point to move Pippin along on his journey to find what he’ll do with his life.”
Director Messana feels as if the play was a general success and feels empathy for the leaving seniors in a subtle, bittersweet way.
It is going to be incredibly hard to see them go. However, in theatre, people don’t ever really leave. We had so many alumni visit to come see the show this weekend. So even after students leave, they still come back to support us and their community.
Ariana Messana
Seniors Keating and McWayne feel compassionate for the play as this will be the first of the end of their years participating in Play Production.
“This show was really emotional for me because it was my last musical at MHS. I am excited for the plays remaining in the year, but I have a deep love and passion for musical theatre that trumps straight plays. I can’t believe I will soon be graduating and I will never again do a musical on the Jenkins auditorium stage,” Keating professed.
“It was an emotional roller coaster. We have a tradition of the presidents gifting each cast and crew member a small moment to remember that show by. As the president I bought everyone little ducks since it reminded everyone of the Theo scenes and the fun memories we had with Aidan,” McWayne detailed.
“I had planned a whole speech about what the ducks mean to me and how much I love everyone there but when I stood up in front of all of my peers I couldn’t help but cry. I had an overwhelming sense of pride and sadness flow through my body. I have never met a more caring and supportive community before and it hurts me so much that I have to leave them,” McWayne concluded.
Pippin was an emotional “end of a beginning” to our seniors’ progress and experiences in Play Production, but once an actor or actress steps into the magical land of Play Production, the community will always be a part of them, especially as they prepare for their journeys in college.
