The HTAC Blog

Chriss Pingaro on Directing “Crazy for You”

     The decision to propose and direct C4U was an easy one.  It’s my last show of college, and it had been my first of high school.  I’m coming full circle.  My excitement and love pushed me to go all out and put it together in an incredibly short amount of time.

     With the unforunate nature of our rehearsal schedule (the intrusion of winter session) this show was put together in a single month.  The rehearsal process was grueling - we worked at least three hours straight every day of the week, and usually those hours were spent dancing.  The cast exhausted themselved phsycially and mentally in order to give their best possible performance.  I’ve never seen a group of people come together in such a short time to create such a masterpiece.  They continue to astound me every day with their ability to take (and remember) direction, to run with scenes and bring out their characters, and (above all) to catch onto the brilliant dance steps.

     You may not be able to tell based on what you saw, but putting on a musical is no easy task, especially one that is so dance-heavy.  It takes hundreds of man hours and a group of people dedicated enough to use those hours to their greatest potential.  Our enormous pit has been rehearsing as a group since the beginning of January in order to conquer the complications that the Gershwin’s score poses.  Members of our cast and production staff studied abroad in January, and they worked on their lines, duties, and characters whilst away.  The people involved in C4U are more than a cast and crew, as cliche as it sounds, they have become something more, something transcended.

     I humbly ask that you took C4U for what it was: HTAC’s return to its musical theatre roots.  It’s about love, fun, dancing and comedy.  It is the epitome of what musical theatre was meant to be - the purest form of entertainment.  It reaches deep down into your soul and pulls out the wide-eyed kid inside, the sucker who still believes in love, the dancer you’ve always wanted to be, the explorer, the dreamer, the fighter.

     Finally, I’d like to dedicate the performance to my old director, my inspiration: Mr. James Steinmeyer.  He took everything I knew about performing and morphed it from a hobby to a life-force.  It runs through the veins of everything we do.  Never lose that feeling of excitement and joy, it’s what keeps us wild and young.