nOUNT CDRttCL Director wanted a brighter musical

By Kyra Smith-Cullen ksmithcullen@dailyitem.com

Mount Carmel Area High School musical director Brandon Mowery wanted to go a lighter route for this year’s musical — in several ways.

“I wanted to do ‘Mamma Mia!’ based on the musicals we’ve done recently. The last few have had dark storylines or had dark appearances on stage,” he said of 2022’s “The Addams Family,” 2021’s “Little Shop of Horrors,” and “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” in 2020.

“I wanted something that was going to be lighter, both visually and dramatically,” he continued.

The fun ABBA jukebox musical was perfect for that, especially since it ended on a number Mowery couldn’t wait for audiences to see.

“The dance montage at the end of the show (Mamma Mia!, Dancing Queen, Waterloo) is my favorite part of the show. They are three songs that are a lot of fun and they have really great choreography” he said. “It’s the cherry on the top of a really awesome show.”

Julia Pitcavage, the senior who portrayed Sophia Sheridan, said “doing the eight minutes of dancing and singing” at the end was her favorite part of the live production.

As Jove Graham noted in his review for The Daily Item, the show gave the cast plenty of opportunities to show off their choreography skills with high-energy numbers.

With a 25-person cast, some of which were students at Our Lady of Lourdes Regional School, there were often a lot of bodies on the stage but Mowery said one of the biggest challenges of the show was finding a way to continue that same level of participation when not all of the performers were visible.

"Every song in the show had ensemble singing and when they were not on stage, they had to sing into microphones backstage,” he said. “There were a few problems at first with volume and sound delay to the back, but we discussed several different ways to be successful and with more practice it got much easier for the students. I was pleased with the end result.”

See MAMMA MIA!, Page 21

Hannah Yucha (Donna Sheridan), Julia Pitcavage (Sophie Sheridan), Dyllan Connell (Sam Carmichael), Dominick Tamborelli (Bill Austin), Broderick Strickland (Harry Bright), Lenny Machesic (Sky), Adriann Rodriguez (Tanya), Gabby McGinley (Rosie), Hanna Zimmerman (Alie), Rebecka Morales (Lisa), Caleb Gensemer (Pepper), Alexys O’Donnell (Eddie); Ensemble: Sugar Bolam, Geoffery Catino, Kaitlyn Fernandez, Loreileii Guise, Nevaeh Katalinas, Jiliian Kerstetter, Kelli Lawton, Mario Ouardi, Jordan Pitcavage, Zoe Siko, Piper Schucker, Madison Smith, Francesca Ventilli; Crew: Samantha Szatny, Alyssa Trefsger, Ava Skavery, Corey Carl, Isabella Jakuc, Landon Musser, Lucas Lubinski, Lucas Edmondson

Director wanted a brighter musical

MAMMA MIA!, from Page 20

As with many young performers, several members of the cast said they had doubts about their abilities.

“The most challenging element leading up to the show was believing in myself and pushing through my fears to put on a good show,” said Hannah Yucha, a senior who made her Mount Carmel musical debut as Donna Sheridan.

Mowery’s confidence in his cast wasn’t shaken.

“There were several times when I thought to myself ‘I’m not worried about this thing’ or ‘I’m not worried about that song.’ I think it was the absence of concern that led me to think it was going to be a good run,” he said.

But one moment stuck out to him as to when he realized how good the show was going to be.

“During one of our vocal rehearsals, the cast was singing S.O.S. and the harmonies were so clear and so strong,” Mowery said. “That was the moment I knew we had something that could be really special as long as they could translate it to the stage. They did a great job with it.”