When Two Friends Say "Let's Put On a Show!"

(Pictured: Anthony Giovino, Claire Shea, Keely Craig, Matt Gagnon and Marco Liguori. Photo credit ASA Photography)

When Two Friends Say “Let’s Put On a Show”!

“YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN”-the musical based on a legendary film, by comedy genius Mel Brooks

By Joanne Dennison

(Westford) -You may be familiar with the classic Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney movie scene where they say “Let’s Put On a Show!” Is that just a movie plot or does it really happen? The answer is “Yes!” at Westford Academy and the proof is the current production of the musical, Young Frankenstein” being held for two weekends in November.

Take two kids, Luke and Larry who meet in grade school, become close friends and all through high school are immersed in theater. Their high school makes it to Massachusetts Educational Theater Guild (METG) every year. One year they win over the very competitive team from Cambridge Rindge and Latin—that just happens to include two guys by the name of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.

Luke heads to Boston College and Larry to Ithaca College and both stay in theater. Luke meets Mike at Boston College. Luke introduces Mike to Larry and the circle keeps growing as they all pursue theater.

Mike Towers becomes the Theater Director at Westford Academy. Mike asks Luke Jorgensen, now on faculty and Assistant Department Head of Theater at Boston College to come and direct some shows, and Larry, now on faculty at Boston Conservatory, to choreograph. The latest collaboration by these three friends is WATA’s “Young Frankenstein”.

And they are not just passing on their theater knowledge, but also creating opportunities for the high school students to create these same lifelong friendships. Being around this group of 65 students that are involved in the production makes this quite obvious. Twenty Seniors are involved in the production, both on and off the stage and all of them have been involved in numerous productions in their four years at Westford Academy. Many of them have roles that have evolved as they went through the productions. They continue to evolve and come back as alumni in many different ways including Scott Cruikshank, WA ’05 as Music Director (and currently a Psych teacher at WA) and Jordan Welch, WA ’10 as Tech Director.

Matt Gagnon started out playing in the pit orchestra for the musicals when he was still in Junior High, and now is the lead as Dr. Frankenstein and will be majoring in Voice in college. He has been balancing the rehearsals while leaving town to perform at the National Association of Music Educators in Nashville. Caroline Lawlor, who plays the female lead, Elizabeth, will be recording her first EP of original music in Nashville in December and will be auditioning for “The Voice” in January. Ben Rigione started going to the summer program in Junior High and got involved with sound and tech “because I liked knowing how things worked” and found he “fit” in theater. For this production he is Sound Design Engineer and will be majoring in Audio at college next year.

Other Seniors on stage are Claire Shea (Inga); Marco Liguori (Igor); Anthony Giovino (The Monster); Ryan Dunn (Dr Victor Von Frankenstein); Morgan Shea(Telegram Girl); Callan Rendall(Dracula); Stephanie Miller (Door Knockers); Raymond Huang (Dancer in Elizabeth’s Entourage); Jess Barry and Sydney Shea( Featured Dancers);Coleman Gilbert, Abby Mills, Ranjani Ramanatham (Ensemble).

Additional Seniors behind the scenes in production are Misha Stapp, Stage Manager;

Catherine Crimmins, Assistant Director; Hanna Fitch, Production Manager and Abigail Welch, Makeup Design; Costume Technicians, Daniah Warde and Felicia Zhang.

“YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN” – Westford Academy Performing Arts Center, 30 Patten Rd, Westford.

Remaining Performances:

November 19, 20, 21, 24 at 7:30pm

Adults: $18.00

Students/Seniors-$12.00

November 22 at 2:00pm Sunday Matinee, All tickets-$12.00

TICKET AVAILABLE ONLINE: www.mktix.com/wata

Tickets can also be purchased at the box office 1 hour before the show.

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