In Step With Jen Turey

By Shannon Hicks

One of Cole Porter’s celebrated hits has been selected to open the 2003–04 Broadway Series at The Shubert Theater in New Haven, and one Newtown dance teacher will be up on stage in the thick of things.

Jen Turey, the owner of Dance, Etc, will be playing Erma for the 13-performance run of Anything Goes that opens tonight. Performances are Friday through Sunday, October 3–12; curtain will be Friday and through Sunday at 8 pm, Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30, and Sunday afternoons at 2. Tickets range from $37 to $67 (with limited $15 tickets also available, all within the last three rows of the theater’s balcony).

Ms Turey auditioned back in the spring for a role in the summer production of Anything Goes at Cape Playhouse in Dennis, Mass. The majority of the performers in the summer production will be in the New Haven show.

Fully planning on taking a role in the chorus, Ms Turey was surprised when the directors asked her to return to follow-up auditions.

“I was like ‘How many times do you need to hear me sing?!’” Ms Turey said recently.

What Ms Turey didn’t know at first was that her singing and dancing had so impressed the directors at Cape Playhouse she was being considered for a speaking role. When the cast listing was posted, her name was printed next to the name of Erma, “the gangster’s gun moll,” explained Ms Turey. It is her first speaking role in a musical.

Speaking, and singing. Ms Turey performs “Buddy Beware.”

“I have my own song, with my own backup,” she laughed. “It’s very exciting.”

Jennifer Turey is a dancer, singer, actress, teacher, and choreographer. She trained at Monroe Dance Academy and has done national and international dance tours. She was a Rockette at Radio City Music Hall. She has also done regional theater in Massachusetts and Westchester County, serving as the dance captain a few years ago for My One and Only, during which she picked up the original Tommy Tune choreography for that production; and played Gloria in Bye Bye Birdie for The Reagles Players in Waltham, Mass., during which time she served as the choreographer’s assistant.

Ms Turey purchased the dance studio in the summer of 2000, and has continued to perform steadily in regional theaters in addition to taking on additional teaching duties and running the studio, which offers gymnastics and dance for all ages.

The production being done in New Haven is Trevor Nunn’s award-winning 1987 revival version of Anything Goes, which opened with Patty LuPone in the role of nightclub queen Reno Sweeney. The Shubert’s production stars Klea Blackhurst (perhaps best known for her tribute to Ethel Merman in Everything The Traffic Will Allow) in the lead female role.

In Porter’s original version, Erma was not even included in the cast.

“[Erma] is similar to the character of Bonnie from the original,” Ms Turey recently explained.

 Dance Etc has opened for the 2003–04 season. The full schedule of classes began at the Mt Pleasant Road studio on September 2, so she had to juggle her regular teaching schedule with rehearsals in New Haven, which began September 23. The cast spent one week rehearsing in an offset location, and moved into the theater this week to prepare for Friday’s opening night.

Ms Turey’s heaviest teaching schedule is on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but she has been able to take care of her students. Her 30-minute call to be at the theater on performance nights is 7:30, which means she can take care of her morning and early afternoon classes.

Alana Neihoff, one of the teachers at Dance Etc, will be taking time off later this year to dance as a Rockette at Radio City Music Hall, so she’s going to need to miss some classes. Ms Neihoff will be covering Ms Turey’s evening classes for a few weeks now, and Ms Turey will repay the favor later in the year.

Tickets can be purchased in person at the theater’s box office, over the phone from the box office (call 203-562-5666), online from tickets.com, or over the phone from tickets.com (800-228-6622). The theater is on College Street, in the arts and entertainment district of New Haven.