Author: The Hippo Press

By Haily Morgan

Actorsingers will present the musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat this weekend — the Nashua-based community theater organization’s first show since the 2020 shutdown.

The show was originally scheduled to hit the stage in May 2020.

“Originally we tried to do Zoom rehearsals,” said Actorsingers board of directors member Evelyn Decker. “Then they started closing theaters, so we actually could not perform anywhere.”

The theater group stayed afloat with the help of grants and savings, she said. Now, two years later, the show is back on.

“We reauditioned. There were a fair amount of people that were in the original try. We also got some new people, and we started over again,” Decker said.

Joseph director Angelica Forcier Rosenthal said she watched as many versions of the musical as she could to help her find her vision for the production.

“Saw a lot of things I knew I did not want to do. I also try to wait to make hard decisions until I know my cast. The actors add so much variety to what’s going on,” Rosenthal said.

The musical is a sung-through comedy with lyrics by Tim Rice and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and was the first Rice-Lloyd Webber musical to be performed publicly, according to a press release. The musical tells the biblical story of Joseph, his father Jacob, his 11 brothers and the coat of many colors, the release said.

Actor Garrett Meyer plays Simon, one of Joseph’s brothers.

“As a collective whole the brothers are very antagonistic and they are the ones that set the play in motion,” Meyer said. He says all of the brothers feed off each other’s energy as well. “From a stage point of view, it is very fun to watch.”

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
When: Friday, May 20, at 8 p.m.; Saturday, May 21, at 2 & 8 p.m.; Sunday, May 22, at 2 p.m.
Where: Keefe Center for the Arts, 117 Elm St. in Nashua
Tickets: $20 for adults, $18 for seniors and students (plus a $2.50 fee), available at actorsingers.org

Featured photo: Pictured Andrew Gibson (standing,) and Jesse Drake. Courtesy photo.

See the work of teen moviemakers at the NH High School Short Film Festival

By Hannah Turtle

listings@hippopress.com

In its 14th year, the New Hampshire High School Short Film Festival has received more submissions than ever before, totalling more than six hours of film from across the state. The films submitted were created and produced entirely by high school students.

The festival, free to attend this year at Chunky’s Cinema Pub in Manchester, will show two hours of this year’s best student films, selected by a panel of 14 judges including teachers and industry experts.

Afterward, awards will be distributed to the top five films and the top two films will be shown at another festival this summer.

After two years of running the festival online, excitement for the in-person festival is particularly high. Mike Place, a veteran of the festival, spoke about what drove the high volume of submissions this year.

“Now that everyone’s back together, there was a big drive to work with other people, with classmates, to just make cool films,” Place said.

With the high volume of submissions this year, the competition was fierce, and narrowing it down was harder than ever.

“All 23 films that made it to the festival are definitely worth watching, they’re entertaining, they tell a story, some of them are just amazing. I even received a couple of phone calls from the judges asking if a few were done by professionals,” Place said. “Some of the films deal with common themes for teenagers — bullying, mental health — and some are just weird, David Lynch-style.”

Michael Shaughnessy, a film teacher at Merrimack High School, has 10 students involved in the festival this year, and is looking forward to having them share their work with the community.

“I want them to recognize that they are part of a larger community of people that create,” Shaughnessy said. “When they go to an event like this, they get to see all the different styles and ability levels. They can see where they have gifts and where they excel, as well as where they need work.”

Gabriella Faro and Tyler Kuslaka, seniors from Salem and Windham respectively, worked together on a film called Second Chances.

“The film is about a girl who gets murdered and gets a second chance in order to find out who did it,” Faro said.

“Our film, on a deeper level, is really about karma. We focused on making it have a deeper meaning than just a ‘high school short film,’” Kuslaka said. “I really hope the audience sees that. I was really inspired by Quentin Tarantino, by those endings that nobody ever sees coming.”

The students particularly enjoyed the filmmaking process, all remarking that the challenges of production helped them to grow as students and filmmakers. The students seemed keen on making the best films possible, hoping to distinguish their work from what one might expect from high school students.

“We put our whole heart and soul into the film,” Faro said.

As for their futures, both Faro and Kuslaka plan to study film in college. Faro will attend Curry College in the fall to study film and communications, and Kuslaka will attend Mount Saint Mary’s University to study film production as well as acting.

This was a common theme among students with work in the festival. Karen Robinson, a media production teacher at Londonderry High School with students in the festival, has four seniors this year, all with plans to pursue some aspect of filmmaking in the fall.

Robinson’s students, all part of a film club at LHS, submitted a film called Pressing Engagement, a comedy about two people who encounter increasingly strange circumstances on their way to a date.

Ahna Gainey and Joshua Truesdale, two LHS seniors, emphasized how much they enjoyed collaborating on the project.

“Our crew worked so well together. I’m just so appreciative of everyone on that team. There’s no way this could have been possible without everyone working together,” Gainey said.

Both Gainey and Truesdale are looking forward to the festival — though for different reasons.

“Last year, it was all on YouTube, which was disappointing. I’m excited to be in an environment with other student filmmakers, and to see everyone’s faces,” said Truesdale.

“Frankly, I’m just excited to see who won,” said Gainey.

New Hampshire High School Short Film Festival
When: Sunday, May 22, at 12:30 p.m. (doors open at 11:30 a.m.)
Where: Chunky’s Cinema Pub, 707 Huse Road, Manchester
Tickets: Tickets are free
More info: nhmediateachers.org

Featured photo: Courtesy photo.