Whiz Kids Perform ‘The Wiz’ in Sheffield
Posted by: Dan Shaw
Posted on: Wednesday, December 17, 2008
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NOTE (12/20): The performances have been postponed because of weather until Saturday, January 3, 2009, at 2 & 7 PM and Sunday, January, 4, at 2 PM
The Berkshires may be the summer theater capital of rural America, but there’s been a shortage of opportunities for theater-loving children who live here year-round and want to be onstage. Thus, Berkshire Pulse, a three-year-old not-for-profit performing arts center in Housatonic known for its multidisciplinary dance classes, decided to offer a musical theater workshop this fall for ten- to fifteen-year-olds. “When we found Lanny Mitchell to teach, then I knew we could put on an entire show,” says managing director Sandy Cleary-Wade. “His professional resume as a performer is impressive and so is his work as a teacher with TriArts and the Falls Village Children’s Theater.”
This weekend, Berkshire Pulse will stage three workshop performances of The Wiz, the 1975 Motown version of The Wizard of Oz. “We have 18 kids from Berkshire, Columbia and Litchfield counties, and they have learned so much from each other,” says Cleary-Wade, noting that the program allows kids to focus more intensely on drama than they ever could in school. “We’re calling it a workshop because we have put this together on next to no budget. Our musical director, Cindy Gutter, who has taught chorus, is a volunteer and my mother, Govane Lohbauer, who runs the costume shop at Shakespeare & Company, volunteered to make the costumes.”
To encourage attendance to the family-friendly show, there are no tickets but donations are encouraged (the suggested donation is $10 for adults and $5 for children, but you can pay what you wish.) Isn’t it ambitious to put on three performances for a theater troupe with no track record at this overly busy time of year? “Yes, but we decided to let it have a run,” says Cleary-Wade. “The live performance is what the kids work so hard towards that we want them to really take a bite out of the experience and savor it more than once.”
The Wiz at the Consolati Performing Arts Center at Mount Everett Regional School,
491 Berkshire School Road, Sheffield
December 19 at 7 PM
December 20 at 2 PM and 7 PM
Berkshire Pulse
410 Park Street, Housatonic; 413.274.6624
