‘Face-Off’
Sarah Blakeney played Christine and Eric Gauldin played the Phantom of the Opera during the Burnet Ensemble Theater Co. production of ‘Phantoms of the Night’ Oct. 24 at Burnet High School.
BURNET — No chandelier crashed onto the stage during the show. Just the same, the Burnet Ensemble Theater Co. brought the house down.
The packed audience gave BETC a standing ovation during curtain call for “Phantoms of the Night” Oct. 24 at the Burnet High School Theater.
“We only had one run-through,” said Burnet teacher Tonya Tiday, director of the show put on by more than 40 Burnet students.
“They did wonderful,” Tiday added. “I’m proud of them.”
Basically, “Phantoms” included an original script created by the BETC junior varsity players that Tiday mixed with music from “The Phantom of the Opera,” written by English composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and sung by BETC varsity vocalists.
Most of the spoken action revolved around a group of teenagers held hostage in a creepy theater by a mysterious, faintly sinister character called “The Gatekeeper” played by Beau Barkley and surrounded by “Phantoms,” played by Amie Balsam, Devon Bolan, Sierra Burt, Kinsey Cozby, Nicole Downey, Jessica Duff, Shalee Golmon, Richard Kershner and Lindsey Parker.
The wayward teens included Grant Arbough, Jenna Bell, Katie Baumgart, Kathryn Bolmes, Michael Childress, Autumn Ellard, Travis Meadows and Lesa McBride, all of them dressed in contemporary casual clothes. Their dialogue including slang such as “dawg” and “dude” drew laughter.
Jessica Duff, Lance Parrott and Kaylee Smith played “statues” who gazed impassively at the stressed teenagers. Bryson Kennedy played “William,” a lonesome child who comforts one of the lost teens.
As the teens struggled to escape, the action shifted back and forth from songs about the anguish of a disfigured and disenchanted “ghost” opera composer who loves Christine, a beautiful soprano.
Perhaps the most appreciative applause came for Sarah Blakeney and Eric Gauldin during their rendition of “Phantom of the Opera,” one of the signature pieces from the Webber score. The high notes on piano played by adult Gay Gambert gave Blakeney a deserved opportunity to stretch her voice.
Meghann McCleskey won patrons over with her earnest reading of “Wishing You Were Here Again.” Blake Reid and Sheridan Schaefer gave the show a fitting finale with “The Point of No Return.”
Other music numbers included “Think of Me” by Elizabeth Hahn and Luke Kennedy; “Angel of Music” by Kennedy, Alexis Barnard, Michael Barnard and Emily Holland; “The Music of the Night” by Gauldin and Julia Hebert; and “Prima Donna” by Bradley Billac, Jacob Caudle, Elizabeth Hahn and Daniel Haynes; and “All I Ask of You” by Reid and Jacqui Devaney.
Phantoms also included “Masquerade,” an energetic dance number, similar to what Tiday did last December with the BETC production of “Wonderful Town.”
Jeffrey Brown, Kelsie Jones, Caitlin Kennedy and Angelica Hymel appeared in “Masquerade.”
Another group of Burnet students put together an array of smart-looking Victorian evening attire for each vocalist (including detailed gowns, masks and capes that could have been worn by Oscar Wilde), and they created lighting for the set.
The “technical theater” troupe included Kinzee Blend, Kaitlin Clark, Holly Gold, Nathan McGinty, Kayla Key, Jacy Nunley, Thomas Oughton, Collin Roberts, Kristen Spinn and Corey Staton.
The technical students will contend with other high schools in University Interscholastic League Theater competition later this year, Tiday said.
Earlier this year, the professional version of “The Phantom of the Opera” broke the record for the longest-running musical on Broadway in New York, and after more than 8,500 performances there, it is still in production at the Majestic Theater. The same show has been in continuous production since 1986 in London, where it has played to more than 9,000 audiences in the West End, second only to “Les Miserables” for longest run ever.
During the New York and London productions, the ghost climbs to the ceiling of a Paris opera house and drops a chandelier onto the stage to frighten a rival from marrying Christine.
Although an imitation chandelier did hover over the audience as visitors watched “Phantoms” in Burnet, it stayed put during the performance.
It takes professionals about seven months to rehearse “Phantom of the Opera” for on-the-road performances, said Gambert, the Kingsland Chamber of Commerce director who volunteered to help the theater group.
“We had six weeks,” she added.
raymond@thepicayune.com
Photo by Raymond V. Whelan