Last week Paramount School of the Arts hosted their own educational workshop version of Broadway in Aurora! Direct from the New York production of Six, the show’s Associate Director, Megan E. Farley, and original cast member and Dance Captain, Mallory Maedke, guided a full capacity class of young performers in a one-day masterclass entitled: SIX! The Experience. I made it a point to sit in on the final half hour of Saturday afternoon’s session so as to not miss the students’ performances and take a few notes from the on point coaching these teaching artists impart. The before and after results were absolutely stunning in how the young teens took to the professional tips and encouragement from Megan and Mallory. Both made their Paramount debuts in our 2016 Broadway Series hit Hairspray directed and choreographed by Amber Mak (Amber’s directing debut here as well!). And now there we were together 5 years later!
Remember the shutdown here on March 12, 2020 and the mandated closing of The Secret of My Success? That very night, Broadway shut down and with it the Opening Night of Six after 4 weeks of previews. Can you imagine that? After all the work, hopes and dreams for your Broadway Opening? Amber and I were more than a little teary-eyed watching the final performance at Paramount and like so many others, felt such empathy for the exceptional women, many from Chicago, who had their Broadway dream in New York postponed that same night. And so here I am, a year and a half later, sitting there in PSA’s beautiful JoAnne McKee Studio Theatre, watching the skills of these remarkably gifted Broadway talents galvanizing this group of young people, studious and star-struck, hanging on to every word of their teachers-for-the-day! A special shout out to the School Administration Staff, Jessica Duplessis, Liz Hilsabeck and their team for making it all happen!
And yesterday the doors of the Main Rehearsal Room in the John C. Dunham Arts Center were flung open to the actors in the cast of Paramount’s Kinky Boots! We’re finally back in rehearsal! There was an especially emotional high enrapturing all of us for the first day of meeting and greeting – and it marks a certain distinctive first in that we are coming out of the pandemic gathering safely in person and as well with our collective consciousness raised in service to Paramount’s initiatives for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. ED&I leadership representative and Associate Artistic Producer Paul Jordan Jansen read Paramount’s Land Acknowledgement composed by the EDI Committee for the Aurora Civic Center Authority. Jordan gave voice to the acknowledgement of our buildings on Ancestral Native Land and paying respects to the Indigenous elders of the Oceti Sakowin (Sioux), Miami, Ho-Chunk (Winnebago), Sawk & Meskwaki, Peoria and Klikappoi (Kickappoo) both past and present. Next it was my turn in sharing these newly invested duties reading the script of our Black Labor Acknowledgement, also created by the EDI Committee. The impact of reading these words can stun and imprint on one’s psyche. It is a whole other experience compounded by speaking them aloud acknowledging the indebtedness to the labor and unwilling sacrifice of forcefully enslaved Africans, their trauma suffered then that is generationally felt and witnessed today. We remember the Black people who toiled the ground where many theaters have been built and resurrected at their often-fatal expense. For more information check out We See You White American Theater.
Director Trent Stork (he/they) has assembled a superstar cast (doing double-duty as Casting Director as well!) and a unity of spirit could be felt in the room as we head en masse to see the splendor of the Paramount Theatre for those first timers among us. We entered through the Stage Door (of course!) and on the way around the corner, comments about how much downtown Aurora has changed could be heard – “and that’s Charlie’s Silver Spoon Creamery right here!” I could just about burst with pride in downtown, the PSA Six masterclass, and yesterday’s First Day of Rehearsal! I muse on how in a way we are not going back to something but going forward; onward to a new era in our changed world!
Love and thanks,
Jim
he/him