By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Sky Frishman is an old hand at playing Cinderella.
The 2017 graduate of the Toledo School for the Arts first played Cinderella when was 9 in the Horizon Youth Theatre’s “Cinderella, the World’s Favorite Fairy Tale.”
“In My Own Little Corner” from the score of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Cinderella” has even been her go-to song for showcases and auditions.
Now Frishman gets to put that favorite tune in context as the lead in Horizon Youth Theatre’s production of “Cinderella.” The musical runs June 22, 23, and 24 at 7 p.m. at Otsego High School.
Narnia Rieske (center) plays the stepmother with Terra Sloane and Melissa Mintz as the stepsisters.
“Cinderella has always been one of my dream roles,” she said.
Director Cassie Greenlee said the familiarity of the story is part of the attraction. Everyone knows the tale. That allows room for interpretation.
The tale has lessons to teach. The story is about choice, she said, about how people choose to act toward others, talk to others, “and what happens when the choice is taken away from them.”
The show’s featured bullies are the stepmother and two stepsisters. As the stepmother, Narnia Rieske is comically haughty. But the script explains that she’s anxious to marry off one of her daughters to the prince because they are running through the money left by Cinderella’s father.
Not that the stepsisters (Terra Sloane and Melissa Mintz) are concerned. They are too self-involved, two brats who are always bickering with each other when not joining forces to bully Cinderella. The pair do a great job on one of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s funniest songs “Stepsisters’ Lament,” a deliciously comic number.
Thomas Long’s prince also gets fleshed out. Fairy tale princes tend to be handsome, suave without much to say. “The prince in this musical is different,” Long said. “He’s not suave. The prince here is a lot more of a dork. … There’s a lot more story
given to this prince.”
This includes his battles with his parents (Alex Evans and Anne Weaver) who are anxious for him to select a bride, so he can settle down, and there once again will be the patter of little feet on the marble floors. But reflecting on their own early love in “Boys and Girls Like You and Me,” they also express sympathy for their son’s romantic ideas of marriage.
The prince, though, sneaks out in disguise to be among common people where he first meets Cinderella.
“It’s really fun to go more in depth,” Long said.
This is rooted in the script, Greenlee said. “The interpretation is there to be made.”
Frishman said her Cinderella is not a passive heroine. “She’s determined to go the ball.” She just needs a little help and prodding from her fairy godmother, played by Olivia Strang, who recently showed off her amazing pipes as the voice of the dragon in BGHS’s “Shrek the Musical.”
The show was not written for youth. It was originally created for television as a star vehicle for young Julie Andrews and only later adapted for the stage.
Greenlee said her “incredibly talented cast,” including a full cast of understudies, is up to the task and ready to make this fairy tale come to life.
(See the complete cast listing at: http://bgindependentmedia.org/tickets-available-now-for-hyts-cinderella/)
