New, old actors invited to audition for ‘Hello Dolly'
The cast from the South Canterbury Drama League's 2021 production of Broadway Melody perform Put on your Sunday Clothes from Hello, Dolly!. PHOTO: BRAD REEVE
Theatre enthusiasts are being encouraged to put on their best Sunday clothes as the South Canterbury Drama League prepares to hold auditions for its next musical Hello, Dolly!
The drama league is seeking both new and experienced performers, inviting anyone interested to come along to an information evening 7pm tonight at the Playhouse on Church St.
In a statement, marketing manager Jill de Joux said the musical would be directed by TJ Ramsay with Ella Thomas as the musical director and Bronwyn Chittock as the choreographer.
"This is a wonderful opportunity for new talent to get involved.
"Hello, Dolly! is a blockbuster Broadway hit filled with humour, romance, dancing and some of the greatest songs in musical theatre history.
"The romantic and comic exploits of Dolly Levi, turn-of-the-20th century matchmaker and 'woman who arranges things', will entertain audiences in late-July/August at the Playhouse.''
She said it had been over 50 years since the drama league last produced Hello, Dolly!
"So we think it's definitely time to bring back this much-loved classic about finding second-chance love.''
Auditions will be held on Sunday at the Playhouse from 2pm. To secure a spot and receive an audition pack email jill@specialevents.co.nz.
— APL
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Otago Daily Times
2 days ago
- Otago Daily Times
Light show back for Matariki event
Ōtepoti Dunedin is set to sparkle for Matariki once more, as the drone light show returns as part of a celebration of Māori culture, reflection and renewal. The free community event will take place from 3pm to 9pm on June 21 at Logan Park. It will feature two drone light shows, weaving art and storytelling. Enterprise Dunedin event producer Allison Wallace said the festival reflected the city's commitment to higher-quality, accessible events that celebrated local culture and brought communities together. "In response to feedback and the popularity of last year's drone show event, which saw 15,000 people there, we have extended the event footprint across Logan Park and have a large food truck and dining area. "We have an earlier drone show for our younger audiences at 6pm, followed by a later show for our teens and adults at 8.30pm. Drones light up the sky at last year's Matariki celebrations at Logan Park. PHOTO: GERARD O'BRIEN "We're excited to announce our headline act as 1 Drop Nation, one of Aotearoa's must-see acts, whose music is a unique blend of roots, rock, funk and reggae." Meanwhile, Ōtepoti Dunedin is preparing to welcome the Māori New Year with the Puaka Matariki Festival — a month-long celebration of renewal, reflection and connection. The festival, now in its 15th year in Ōtepoti, runs from June 14 to July 12. The programme includes 26 events across Ōtepoti Dunedin, from a traditional hautapu ceremony, to the sharing of kai and kapa haka performances along with the return of the festival's drone show. Paulette Tamati-Elliffe, of Te Rūnaka o Ōtākou, said as a community, people had been celebrating both Puaka and Matariki for many years. Enterprise Dunedin Destination Manager Sian Sutton said the upcoming programme of events across the city was a chance to deepen our connection to te ao Māori. "Puaka Matariki is a uniquely powerful time of reflection and unity. "We're thrilled to bring this to life for our city and we're particularly excited by the collaborative process with mana whenua to ensure the event is culturally appropriate and reflective of Matariki values." — APL
Otago Daily Times
2 days ago
- Otago Daily Times
Puppetry feature of show
Indian Ink Theatre Company co-founder and actor Jacob Rajan on-stage with a hand-built vulture and puppeteer Jon Coddington in a scene from Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream. Photo: Ankita Singh New Zealand's Indian Ink Theatre Company will bring their acclaimed show Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream to Dunedin in September. Written by Indian Ink founders Jacob Rajan and Justin Lewis, and directed by Lewis, the production combines theatre, comedy, puppetry, and music. In a statement, Indian Ink said Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream showcased Rajan's unique solo performance talents, channelling seven characters, while weaving a story of the afterlife with a dash of Bollywood into the real-life mystery of India's vanishing vulture. In typical Indian Ink style, Rajan will be accompanied on stage by a crafted life-size vulture, created and puppeteered by Jon Coddington. Rajan said the premise of the show was that our lives are but melting ice cream and the transition between this world and the next is never easy. For main character Kutisar, it is made profoundly more difficult when his passage to paradise depends on the guidance of a vulture, but they have disappeared from India's skies. A rebellious young woman from Mumbai's enigmatic Parsi community — a people whose faith is entwined with the vulture — holds the key that may yet deliver him. Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream was inspired by Ernest Becker's Pulitzer prize-winning Denial of Death, and the vibrant, life-filled chaos of India's most cosmopolitan city. Rajan and Lewis had the idea for the script after a trip to Mumbai in 2019. The pair were captivated by the city, its people and its secrets — in particular the mystery of India's vanishing vultures, one of the fastest mass extinctions of all time. Indian Ink are one of Aotearoa's most celebrated theatre companies, and Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream is a testament to their success. Following a critically acclaimed New Zealand tour in 2021, the production captivated audiences across Hawai'i, Australia, Canada and Singapore. — APL
RNZ News
3 days ago
- RNZ News
‘That was rude': why the new Broadway musical Death Becomes Her was ripe for TikTok memes
By Gregory Camp of Photo: AFP A few snippets of musicalised dialogue from the cast album of the new Broadway musical Death Becomes Her - with music and lyrics by Julia Mattison and Noel Carey, and a book by Marco Pennette - have recently become trending sonic memes on TikTok. In all sorts of situations, users are lip synching to audio clips of Broadway star Jennifer Simard, in the character of Helen Sharp (played by Goldie Hawn in the 1992 cult film on which the musical is based), saying things like "That was rude. That was pretty f**kin' rude" and "She stole my life. She made me cuckoo. She's why I spent four years locked in that health spa." Musical theatre fans love a good meme (scholar Trevor Boffone has written a whole book about the phenomenon) and Death Becomes Her is primed to create a lot of them: a show featuring two divas (played by Simard and Megan Hilty as Madeleine Ashton, Meryl Streep's role in the movie) based on a cult film about divas begs to be shaped and reshaped by fan culture. Helen and Madeleine are longtime rivals who both take a magic potion that makes them immortal. This leads them to find increasingly extravagant ways to try and do away with each other, with the help of Helen's put-upon husband Ernest (Christopher Sieber), a plastic surgeon who reluctantly falls into the role of restoring their bodies after each "accident". Some of Hilty's clips have also been TikTok-ified (notably Tell Me, Earnest) but Simard is winning the numbers game. Her "That was rude" clip alone has 321,000 videos and counting. There seem to be two main reasons for the attraction of these clips. First is Simard's delivery of the words. Simard is a longstanding Broadway star and an expert at musical comedy timing. Second is the rhythmic quality of the dialogue. Not fully sung, these bits are spoken in mostly strict rhythm over orchestral accompaniment. That they have become such earworms demonstrates it is not only melody that burrows into the brain, but also rhythmic contour. There is a long history of this style of speak-singing in musical theatre, notably popularised in the late 1950s by Robert Preston in The Music Man and Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady. Neither of those actors was a strong singer, but both had excellent timing and were able to deliver spoken lines above music with a strong sense of musicality. Simard is an excellent singer with a very wide range, but the comic role of Helen - ever the underdog to her rival famous actress Madeleine - lends itself to this style of heightened speech. Most effective rhythmically, and the most popular excerpt, is the "That was rude" meme, where Simard begins slowly without accompaniment; the bass comes in on "rude" and sets a groove for the rest of the short excerpt. This one has been used in every possible situation, from responses to nasty notes left on people's cars to complaints about incorrect drink orders. Some of the TikTokers refer to Simard in on-screen text, but this one seems to have become popular outside any specific reference to the show, in a truly viral moment. The lengthiest of the trending excerpts is the one that begins with "We talked about killing her before", which sets off a monologue about Helen's plan to do away with Madeline once and for all. This is a tour de force for Simard's comic timing, as it begins in free rhythm and then gradually takes on a more consistent beat. TikTokers are tending to use this one primarily as a demonstration of their lip-syncing skills, as opposed to the other shorter clips that are applied in different ironic situations. This trend also shows the continuing importance of the cast album in musical theatre culture. The majority of TikTokers probably have not seen the show, currently only playing on Broadway with high ticket prices. Yet the cast album (easily available on all the main streaming sites) gives access. The fact these clips come from a cast album also more easily allows fans to create their own visuals around it. Unless they actually saw the show they only have production photographs and short publicity clips (and the occasional shaky bootleg or slime tutorial) to go on in terms of what it looks like. Audio from a source like the soundtrack of the Wicked movie has not led to so many lip-sync videos because the visual track is so readily accessible; as a film, Wicked's visuals define its audio while a cast album can more easily work the other way round. I saw Death Becomes Her on Broadway in January and enjoyed it. It's a fun show full of special effects and comic bits. The score is serviceable (it's not Sondheim), but it is catchy - very important for its use in these TikTok trends - and well performed by Simard and the rest of the cast. This whole phenomenon demonstrates that the current cultural sphere of "Broadway" extends well beyond the street itself. This has been the case at least since the rise of the cast album in the 1950s (My Fair Lady's was the best-selling LP of 1956), but now the reach is intensified by social media spaces like TikTok; you don't have to have actually seen Death Becomes Her to experience it.
