Every March, Woodbridge High School puts on a musical. This year, our musical is Sweeney Todd: The Demon of Barber Fleet Street. A lot of talent shows up to act, dance, and sing in the show. To decide which talent performs as who and makes it at all, sixteen-year musical co-directors Mr. T and Mr. Lynch host auditions.
Auditions are split into three days. This particular cycle, they are doing singing on Monday, a break for Drama Club, and play rehearsal on Tuesday. Then they’ll be acting on Wednesday, dancing on Thursday, callbacks on Friday, and the cast list will be released that night.
Both the acting and singing are conventional auditions. However, dance is not. Auditionees are given time to learn a dance, and then perform it in a group of five or six.
“Since musicals are a combination of three arts, we make our students audition for all three,” said Mr. Lynch. “We decided early on that you have to try (all three). You might be a terrible dancer, but if you care enough to be in this, you have to do one day of each. We always cast people who are not equally strong in all three.”
The Auditionees
Seniors and year three musical auditionees Julien Catalon, Olivia Spano, and Cassandra “Cassie” Ramos, along with year two auditionee, sophomore Randy Peralta were all very excited to audition once again this year.
“Show up and show out..,” said Catalon when asked what advice he would give to a first-year auditionee, “(be)cause if not now, when.”
“From when you get the packet of all the audition information, you have to practice and practice,” said Ramos. “If you’re gonna fail, fail fabulously.”
All interviewed agreed that auditions were nerve-racking at first, described as a good thing due to wanting to showcase their best to Mr. T, Mr. Lynch, and the remaining people watching auditions. When asked why they came back, all said they found friends, family, and a passion for musical theater during their first show. Some described it as feeling like a family, others a friend group, but they all agreed on said comradery.
“I made a lot of new friends…I just had a great time,” said Peralta.
Check out The Barron Perspective’s articles on past musicals!
