Residents Consider Themselves Right

At Home In Local Production Of ‘Oliver’

By Shannon Hicks

DANBURY — If Bianca Crudo is correct, audiences who show up for any of the next three weekends for a performance of Oliver! The Musical at The Portuguese Cultural Center in Danbury won’t be able to help themselves: They will sense and feel the enthusiasm that has been growing in the cultural center’s ballroom all summer.

The costumes and props are gorgeous. The musicians — Broadway musical director Arnie Gross on synthesizer, along with bass player Henry Lugo, drummer Roger Post, trombonist Paul L. Riley, and Sabrina Post (who is also the show’s director, musical director. and choreographer) — are all tuned up and ready to play. The actors have learned their parts, so rehearsals are going well. And the reservation line is buzzing.

Stage Door Productions, the arts and entertainment organization of the cultural center, will present Oliver! on Fridays and Sundays, July 28 to August 13. Anyone from Newtown who heads over to the productions most likely will see at least one face on stage they recognize — or they will know of someone who is working behind the scenes — because 32 of the 42 cast members are Newtown residents, as are many of the crew members.

The musical production of Charles Dickens’s tale, with book, music, and lyrics by Lionel Bart, was in its final dress rehearsals this week, which meant long nights in the grand ballroom of the Portuguese Cultural Center, where Stage Door Productions offers its performances.

Maria Zargo, the president of Stage Door Productions, is producing the show; Len Zargo is associate producer. Sabrina Post, the former choral director and Drama Club advisor at Newtown High School, is directing her first show for Stage Door Productions, and has cast Newtown resident Taylor Varga in the title role.

Set designer (and Newtown resident) Andrew Knapp is as busy as everyone else, but as cast and crew were feverishly heading toward opening night he feels like he’s taking it easy these days compared to what he was working on earlier this year.

Mr Knapp is “coming off a crazy spring — I had five shows going,” he said this week. Oliver! is the only project Mr Knapp is working on right now, and he is enjoying everything about it.

Mr Knapp has done the sets for at least ten productions of Oliver! so he was able to refer to previous specs when designing for the Danbury production. Many of his set pieces were geared for higher stages, but they have been adapted. Some of the pieces “just clicked,” said Mr Knapp, and still others were constructed specifically for the Danbury show.

Among the pieces that came from Mr Knapp’s personal collection are a pair of side chairs that have been in every production he’s done of Oliver! The gold-painted wooden chairs, with red upholstery (which has been reupholstered “several times,” the set designer pointed out), were originally acquired from the Metropolitan Opera.

Taylor Varga, who will be entering sixth grade at Reed Intermediate School next month, has done a number of elementary school plays and played a mouse in the 2004 Summer Theater Connection (STC) production of Cinderella at Newtown High School

Oliver Twist is his first lead role.

He is following somewhat in the steps of older brother Nick, who performed in at least four NHS drama department shows, but Taylor also remembers his epiphany moment.

“I was watching [the curtain call] of The Lion King on Broadway and I turned to my mom and said, ‘What do I have to do to get up there?’”

Taylor’s summer plans have been changed somewhat from what he intended. While it is still theater-oriented, it was not at the cultural center that he envisioned himself a few months ago.

When some of his friends started talking about participating in shows at Richter Arts Center, he figured he would join them, the young aspiring thespian said this week. But when his mother saw the audition announcement for Oliver! at the cultural center and asked if he wanted to try out, he figured it couldn’t hurt. Then he landed the Oliver role and his plans for Richter were put aside.

Not that he is complaining.

“It’s been really nice to work with Sabrina Post,” said Taylor, who watched his older brother work with the same director many times.

Having wowed audiences in numerous NHS drama department and STC shows, Brett Boles needed to take a break from performing after he headed into the second half of his college career. Oliver! represents the first time Mr Boles is on the stage since 2004, when he did Godspell with Summer Theater Connection. He was part of the acting cast for NHS productions of Show Boat, Les Miserables, and Anything Goes while a student, plus at least two summer workshop productions and landed the lead in Wilton Playshop’s 2002-03 season opener, Big River.

“I’ve actually been too busy to act,” Mr Bowles said Tuesday afternoon. “I’m majoring in music composition for theater and writing a lot now.

“But I just needed to have some fun this summer and this was perfect. It’s a charming place, a good atmosphere,” said Mr Boles, who heads back for his senior year at Ithaca College in just a few weeks. Until then, he will be performing as Oliver Twist’s benefactor, Fagin.

Andrew Nichols, the Newtown resident playing The Artful Dodger and whose name is also recognizable from a number of NHS drama playbills, also loves being onstage.

“I love the theater. It’s just a great experience,” he said this week, in costume and awaiting the start of Tuesday evening’s run-through. “With something like this, you get to see a lot of friends over the summer while doing some hard work and putting out something great.”

Bianca Crudo will be playing Charlotte (Mrs Sowerberry’s daughter) as well as one of the members of Fagin’s gang. The 14-year-old is another member of the cast who is a veteran of stage (and in her case, screen) productions, and she is obviously enjoying how she is spending part of her summer vacation.

“It’s a very welcoming place,” Bianca said. “I see kids who are doing their first production, but everyone’s very welcoming.”

Andrew Nichols echoed that, saying that while Oliver! is far from his first theater experience, he has been watching as one of his friends has been enjoying her first auditions, rehearsals, and soon, performing for an audience.

“She came in with no experience, and everyone has been very helpful to her,” he said.

Donna White is a Newtown resident who is also happy to find herself in comfortable surroundings for this, her first time on stage. The mother of two actually took her daughter Caitlin to auditions back in the beginning of May for the show, at the encouragement of Christine Crudo (Bianca’s mother, who is one of the costume mistresses for Oliver!), and ended up taking a chance herself. Caitlin did well during auditions and was even cast for the show, but when it turned out she would be away for the first weekend of performances, she opted out.

Donna White, meanwhile, was picked to be part of the women’s ensemble, playing one of the townspeople, and is “having a blast.”

“This is the first time I’ve ever done this and it’s been so much fun,” said the stay-at-home mom, who has a sales background, as Caitlin — who has been joining her mother for most of the rehearsals — played in the background, quietly humming and singing to herself. “I’ve been doing some photography and videography for myself, but I really needed a creative outlet.”

Now that the acting bug has bitten, Donna is hooked.

“I’ll probably be back,” she said. Maybe next year Stage Door Productions will have a mother-daughter team featured in its show.

Before heading downstairs to get into her costume, Bianca Crudo looked around the room filled with people of all ages, tables laden with half-eaten dinners, snacks, and backpacks, a stage with set pieces being put into place, overheard snippets of music and lyrics, and countless conversations taking place, and she smiled.

“It’s so much fun here,” she said. “Just coming to rehearsal is great. I can tell that if I’m having this much fun now, the audiences are going to really have a lot of fun.”

Oliver! The Musical will be performed at The Portuguese Cultural Center, 65 Sand Pit Road in Danbury, on Fridays, July 28, and August 4 and 11; and Saturdays, July 30, and August 6 and 13.

Friday evenings will begin with a reception at 6, dinner buffet served at 6:30, and curtain at 8. Sunday afternoons will start with a 12:30 reception, lunch buffet at 1, and curtain at 3.

Tickets are $35 for adults, $25 for students, and $5 for ages 6 and under; infants will be admitted free. All ticket prices include the preshow buffet; there are no “show only” tickets.

For reservations or additional information call 470-7528 or send email to StageDoorCT@aol.com.