Alanna Weatherby and Noah Sternhill. SRJC Theatre Arts, photo by Thomas Chown

By ROBERT DIGITALE

The folks at Santa Rosa Junior College Theatre Arts likely knew they had another hit with “Mary Poppins” when the audience started applauding in the middle of a dance number.

This happened not once but twice at the musical’s Friday premiere as the packed house spontaneously expressed its delight: Once for the cast’s high-energy steps and once for the clever movement of fantastical characters covering the stage.

Such spectacles – plus, the chance to see a certain umbrella-toting nanny flying above it all – captivated the crowd but remained merely the icing on the cake, or the spoonful of sugar, for the feast that was served up to expectant theatergoers. Once more SRJC has shown it can combine all the right ingredients for a great night of musical theater.

The proper mix certainly included the leading lady, Alanna Weatherby. Suffice to say she is practically perfect as Mary Poppins. At the opening she displayed an amazing voice and a sure comedic timing, a helpful gift when playing a character who keeps almost everyone else perpetually off balance.

Weatherby on Friday won a rousing ovation from the audience, as did Noah Sternhill as Bert. He naturally embodied the easygoing jack-of-all-trades and co-conspirator for the adventures of Mary and the Banks children. And the young man certainly held his own in the singing and dancing department.

The musical, by Disney and Cameron Mackintosh, is based upon both the 1964 film with Julie Andrews and the stories by P.L. Travers. It remains a tale of two unruly children, Jane and Michael Banks, and their preoccupied parents. Enter Mary Poppins, and the family is sure to never be the same.

Those who grew up solely on the movie will be regularly readjusting as both the recognizable and the strange appear. Some of the film’s songs remain (“Chim Chim Cher-ee,” “Feed the Birds,” and that “Supercali…” mouthful). But some numbers appear at different points in the tale, with different verses, and a number of new songs have been added. Moreover, just when the plot seems familiar, along comes an unexpected twist. My advice: Accept that you are watching a new story and let it surprise you.

Under the direction of Laura Downing-Lee, the supporting cast adds plenty of magic. Stirring were the voices of Katie Wigglesworth as Winifred Banks, Stacy Rutz as the Bird Woman and Victoria Hill as the “Holy Terror,” aka Miss Andrew. Alysah Hruby and Freyja Kremer shone in their roles Friday as Jane and Michael Banks (they alternate the parts with Madigan Love and Annelise Ethington respectively.) And Heston Scott as George Banks handled well the challenges of portraying a demanding, distant father whose world is about to turn upside down.

The three-dozen cast members repeatedly filled the stage as the children’s adventures with Mary and Bert inevitably led to song and dance. The members added a host of bright embellishments by their acting, singing and dancing. A special treat was the dance solo by Joseph Favolora as Neleus.

Scenic designer Peter Crompton’s set and backdrops once more were a delight to the eye. At times we seemed to be looking inside a furnished dollhouse that could open up to reveal a parlor, a nursery or a kitchen. Pull those pieces back and the stage effortlessly transforms into a street, a park, a bank or the rooftops of London.

And the orchestra, under the direction of Janis Dunson Wilson, provided a measured energy to underpin the musical extravaganza.

In short, it’s a lot of fun.

That shouldn’t surprise anyone who’s been paying attention to the ongoing theatrics at Burbank Auditorium. Each fall for the last four years, the college has produced a quality musical, including “My Fair Lady,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Les Misérables” and last year’s knockout “Phantom of the Opera.”

Now it can add “Mary Poppins” to that list.

The good news is there are still nine performances remaining between this Friday after Thanksgiving and Dec. 6. That includes four matinees and five evening shows. For tickets, click here.

From: Sonoma State University

By ROBERT DIGITALE

Sonoma State University’s “The Hummingbird Wars” lets us watch how an Afghan war veteran copes as the lives of his wife, son and daughter

spin increasingly out of control.

Isn’t the vet supposed to be the one suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder? But Warren, a dad and a decorated war hero, seems more adept than most men at holding himself together under life’s pressures. One minute he’s managing to avoid tension with his politically active law professor wife. The next he’s agreeing to let his daughter’s heavily medicated girlfriend move in with the family. And after that he remains steady and calm while trying to ascertain why his son took a loaded gun to high school.

Despite Warren’s best efforts, life unravels. The son eventually reveals he has more guns than friends (though we begin to guess who was really

(Left to right): David O’Connell, Renee Hardin, Rosemarie Kingfisher and Carlos Rodriguez star in “Hummingbird Wars” at Sonoma State University. (COURTESY OF DAVID PAPAS)

stockpiling them). The daughter’s girlfriend somehow becomes even more medicated and foul mouthed. The daughter goes into cocoon mode. And the mom becomes convinced she’s disappearing.

In the midst of all the mayhem, we at last begin to learn a little of what Warren went through in Afghanistan and what’s at stake if he should give up on those he loves.

It’s an intimate work, performed in the university’s Studio 76 black box theater in Ives Hall.

The work by Carter Lewis, a playwright in residence at Washington University of St. Louis, is characterized in the program as a black comedy. It’s a protest of sorts against more than a decade of U.S. involvement in war and against what director Judy Navas calls “world domination by corporations.”

The humor and the list of how the world’s gone wrong can come rapid fire. A drug advertisement giving the usual mind-numbing list of possible side effects sounds like Robin Williams wrote it. And the mom assures her husband that five minutes of quiet reflection will lead to “the tingle of impending doom.”

At Thursday’s opening, the small cast brought the work alive, led by David O’Connell as the father. He made Warren a mild-mannered and truly likable creature. At first we see a naturally self-deprecating and selfless fellow, but over time we begin to sense the wounds he still carries from his days as a warrior.

Renee Hardin, as Tracey, the daughter’s girlfriend, gets to be the wildest and wackiest character, a psychologically fragile young woman who relies on meds to barely hold things together.

Adding the right mix of strangeness and attitude are Ashlyn Kelley as the mom Mel, Carlos Rodriguez as the son Pete, and Rosemarie Kingfisher as the daughter Kate.

The play continues through Nov. 15 with evening performances Thursday through Saturday and matinees on Sunday. For tickets, click here.

Still ahead this season are the musical “Into the Woods,” Feb. 4-14, and William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” May 3-8.

SSU Theatre Arts: photo by David Papas

By ROBERT DIGITALE

What would Honest Abe do?

In these combative times, it would be nice if Sonoma State University ‘s latest theatrical production, “Abraham Lincoln’s Big Gay Dance Party, ” could tell us how our most revered president would handle today’s culture wars.

I suppose that’s an unanswerable question, much like another one the play asks but doesn’t give a clear response to: Was Lincoln gay?

The conjecture on the 16th president’s sexuality instead becomes the jumping-off point for an often-saucy tale involving one of the bigger cultural clashes of our time: gay rights.

At Thursday night’s premier, which kicked of SSU Theatre Arts new season, the eight cast members excelled in making the most of this three-act play. They hung with its twists and turns, from the politically farcical to the slapstick silly to the deadly bizarre. Their energy, comedic timing and cocksure embodiment of sometimes dog-eat-dog behavior showed much talent.

Also, they looked cute as an octet of dancing Lincolns, each with chin curtain beards and stovepipe hats.

Still, the audience should come prepared for a degree of strangeness with this work. It starts with an elementary school Christmas pageant in rural Menard County, Ill. A schoolteacher produces a skit where the 9-year-olds explain to their parents how Honest Abe was in love with his best male friend.

If that educational scenario sounds believable to you, then all that follows will seem natural, from the Pulitzer-prize-winning New York Times reporter who is bent on destroying his gay-hating archenemy to said opponent’s convenient spiral into what appears to be homophobic/acohol-induced madness.

For plot, the play follows the criminal trial of the since-fired schoolteacher, who is being prosecuted by a self-righteous district attorney/former congressman. The reporter is out to get the D.A., who he blames for having made the AIDS crisis worse. A state senator also gets involved as part of a scheme for besting the D.A. in an upcoming race for the Republican gubernatorial primary.

One of the play’s twists is the chance for the audience to decide which of the three acts will go in what order (by texting the selection, of course.) Thursday’s vote seemed legit, and the mostly younger crowd enthusiastically got caught up in the outcome when it came time to choose the second act.

The playwright, Aaron Loeb, who attended Thursday’s performance, is certainly adept at dialogue. The play is filled with culturally hip zingers, raunchy provocations and cutting lines as the characters defend themselves. In one scene, the reporter and state senator heatedly debated who was standing on the higher moral ground. They each had their seemingly watertight arguments. Nonetheless, it helped to remember that each of them also had shown a willingness to push a noncombatant in front of, if not under, the proverbial bus in order to get what he/she wanted.

In that regard, the play doesn’t offer much hope for how we Americans will handle our disagreements. That may fit the times, where take-no-prisoners politics seems increasingly the order of the day. But it is an interesting choice to constantly have Lincoln(s) standing in the background as the drama unfolds. Here was a leader who stepped into the middle of our worst culture wars episode, one that left more 620,000 Americans dead. We revere him not simply because he took an assassin’s bullet, but also for where he sought to point us. It seems we still have much to learn about what he meant by “with malice toward none, with charity toward all.”

A tip of the stovepipe hat to cast members Connor Pratt, Matthew Lindberg, Phil Tran, Joe Ingalls, Jasmin Lewis, Anna Leach, Victoria Saitz and Katee Drysdale.

The play, directed by Doyle Ott, continues tonight with more performances through Oct. 24. For details, click here.

The season continues Nov. 5-15 with “The Hummingbird Wars,” followed by “Into the Woods,” Feb. 4-14, and “Hamlet,” May 3-8.

By ROBERT DIGITALE

“Almost, Maine,” Santa Rosa Junior College’s latest theatrical production, is a little like going out for dim sum. It’s got plenty of one-scene stories that are bite-sized, tasty and fun.

The play, by John Cariani, was a smart choice to kick off the new Theatre Arts season. The multiple stories seemed to come together quickly, a good thing so early in the academic year. The play gave lots of cast members their own moments in the spotlight. And the audience at Friday’s premiere loved it.

“Almost” is a small town in northern Maine that we are told “doesn’t quite exist.” We look in on several scenes all set there on a Friday winter night about 9 p.m., right before the mystical aurora borealis shines forth.

What we encounter are people seeking love, though not all of them know it yet. A few will fall out of love. Some won’t find love. Most, to the delight of the audience, will do the opposite.

Each of the eights scene is intimate (as are the prologue, “interlogue” and epilogue). All but one have only two people sharing the stage.

In the stories we meet a diverse group: The outsider, determined to see those unearthly northern lights so she can say farewell to her dead husband; the heartbroken fellow who meets his ex-girlfriend shortly before her wedding day; the former resident who returns years later to finally give an answer to an old high school flame who had asked to marry her.

The play at times goes from the whimsical to the wacky: Speaking literally of broken hearts, explaining the physical diminishment caused by lost hope and making stern entreaties to hand back “all the love I gave you.” You’ll enjoy all this if you can just give in and suspend belief.

What makes it all work are the performances of the young cast members. They embody the strange and lonely characters, including those who have found an opening for love and intend to doggedly pursue it. And with all those layers of winter clothing, they turned getting undressed into a comedic act.

A tip of the hat to the cast members: Danny Medina, Pales Gensler, Cooper Bennett, Miranda Williams, Matthew Heredia, Peyton Victoria, Christine Vondralee, Kot Takahashi, Ruby Poze, Brent Marshall, Zaki Shaheen, Daniel Banales, Daniel Conner, Jackie Wurst, Allegra O’Rourke, Andrea Rosales-Jacinto and Marcos Rivas.

The night included two extra treats: Opening entertainment by the nine-member group Take Jack, which has done pre-show music for three other Theatre Arts productions; and the guitar music in between acts by musician Jesse Boggs.

“Almost, Maine” continues Wednesday Sept. 30 and runs each night through Saturday Oct, 3, plus matinee performances to be given Saturday and Sunday Oct. 3-4.

The season will continue Nov. 20 to Dec. 6 with “Mary Poppins.” “Emotional Creature” runs March 4-13, followed by Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night,” April 22 to May 8.

For information and tickets, click here.

From Santa Rosa Junior College/SRT

By ROBERT DIGITALE

With Friday’s premiere of “South Pacific,” Summer Repertory Theatre showed once more its great strength: Bringing together talented college actors from around the country and giving them the chance to sing their hearts out.

Now audiences are waiting to see what the energetic cast will do with the remaining four shows, including Jane Austen’s “Emma,” which opens Tuesday. “Emma” will be followed by “Peter and the Star Catcher,” “Tartuffe” and “Little Shop of Horrors.” The season runs through Aug. 8 at Santa Rosa Junior College.

After four weeks of rehearsals, the nearly 30 young actors emerged Friday night to present a rousing version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s tale of love and prejudice set against the backdrop of World War II.

“Welcome, welcome to our 44th season,” SRT’s artistic director James Newman told the audience before the show at the junior college’s Burbank Auditorium.

South Pacific comes at you with an array of catchy show tunes: the childlike “Dites Moi,” the testosterone-fueled “There is Nothing Like a Dame,” the ethereal “Bali Hai,” the bouncy “Honey Bun,” and the nearly operatic warbling of “Some Enchanted Evening.”

For each number, the SRT cast sang to please, displaying talent, grace and power as desired. If you enjoy classic musical theater, these young people will leave you smiling.

The musical, which premiered in 1949, stood out in its era for addressing racism. The heroine, Nellie Forbush of Little Rock, Ark., and Princeton grad/Marine Lt. Joe Cable both have to confront their own prejudices in connection with separate romances that blossom amid the tropical islands. Their inner struggles add to the drama as Cable and Forbush’s love interest, French planter Emile de Becque, both find themselves in harm’s way.

Emily Kristen Morris as Nellie, Noah Weisbart as Emile and Riley McFarland as Joe all make us care what their fates will be. A tip of the hat to the entire cast, especially the comic relief artists of Michaela Jose as Bloody Mary and Sam Arnold as Luther Billis.

Director James Newman keeps it all moving with a focus on two questions: What’s Nellie going to decide and will she decide too late? The set by Scenic Designer Sean Fanning effectively conjures up the naval installation, the French planter’s home and the mysterious Bali Hai. The 13-piece orchestra conducted by Nancy Hayashibara provides the needed accompaniment for every twist of musical style.

After four decades, it remains a wonder how SRT keeps the shows spinning along throughout the summer, often with two shows a night.

For tickets, call 527-4307 of click here.

Sydnie Johnson and Erin Galloway. Photo by Tom Chown

By ROBERT DIGITALE

The Big City boy moves to Hicksville. The preacher’s daughter runs wild. A decree goes forth that some key component of youth culture (in this case, dancing) must be banned in order to protect the children. A teen crusade begins in order to set the old folks straight.

The ingredients all seem familiar to American theater. However, the musical “Footloose” manages to rise a few steps above mere formula. And Santa Rosa Junior College Theatre Arts offers its latest production with toe-tapping fun and a few scenes that tug at the heart.

The play begins with a hero named Ren, who in his senior year must move far from hometown Chicago to the mythical town of Bomont. Ren’s father has abandoned both wife and son, so Ren and his mom go to live with his aunt and uncle. The young man quickly finds himself a misfit, especially when it comes to his love for dancing. Dancing is illegal in Bomont. It has been ever since a carload of teens died in a car crash while coming back from an out-of-town dance. All this sets up a confrontation between Ren and the Rev. Shaw Moore, the chief prohibitionist.

Unlike some teen musicals, “Footloose” allows us to hear from the adults as well as the youth. We learn some of the bottled-up angst of both Ren’s mom and the preacher’s wife. Moreover, the play resists the temptation of making the minister the easy villain. Instead, it portrays a man who has a stubborn, authoritarian streak but also doubts and pain.

Indeed, some of the play’s more poignant moments come in later scenes where Ren and the preacher’s daughter separately confront the man of the cloth. Here Erin Galloway as Ren, Sydnie Johnson as Ariel, the daughter, and Nathaniel Mack as the minister all shine in their acting.

Friday’s opening night included some shaky moments for the company in the vocal department. But musical highlights included several strong numbers with scene-stealers Sidney McNulty, Phoenix Piombo and Andrea Rosales-Jacinto, as well as a catchy rendition of “Mama Says” by Evan Held, Danny Medina, Alex Sterling, Nick George and Galloway.

A tip of the hat to the company, including director Wendy Wisely and cast members Bridget Wyckoff, Emma Hill, Nate Mercier, Kitty Rutherford, Rick Denniston, Heston Scott, Whitney Lawson, Chris Riebli, Brett Mollard, Landon Scott, Adam Miller, Katie Wigglesworth, Jason Meyer, P.S. Nordqvist and Olivia Yeates.

The play continues Thursday and runs over the next two weekends, ending with a May 3 matinee during the college’s annual Day Under the Oaks celebration. For tickets and show times, click here or call the box office, 527-4343.

Photo by David Papas

By ROBERT DIGITALE

Sonoma State Univerity’s Theatre Arts Department this season seems bent on giving things a twist.

Last fall the department put on “The Importance of Being Earnest,” but set the action in India instead of England.

Then in February it produced “Heroines,” its own theatrical creation with songs taken from such operettas as “The Pirates of Penzance” and “The Threepenny Opera.”

Now comes “Orchard Development,” an adaptation of Anton Chekov’s “The Cherry Orchard,” but set in the American Midwest of the early 1900s.

“The Cherry Orchard” tells of Russian aristocrats who have fallen on hard times in an era of great social upheaval. Their estate and its touchstone cherry orchard are about to be sold at what we today would call a foreclosure auction. Despite a few brief glimmers of hope, the family seems incapable of saving the land they suggest is linked to their souls.

Now comes the twist. The SSU adaptation, directed by Paul Draper with choreography by Kristen Daley, is described as “a multi-media dance/theatre mash-up.” The interplay of a dozen actors is mirrored or fancifully embellished by 13 dancers. Live TV feeds, including video selfies from what appears to be a smart phone, are projected on screens big and small to give intimate, digital close-ups of the characters.

The result does succeed in at least one area: adding a little wonder to a drama where the outcome seems progressively less in doubt as each act unfolds. If the actors seem locked into a fate, much as the butler is locked into the main house at the story’s end, at least you can say, “I wonder, what will the dancers make of this next scene?” Sometimes the dance helps better than words to evoke the story’s sense of lingering loss. For example, the “ghost” of the heroine’s child son striding above the stage atop the hands of the other dancers was particularly striking.

For their part, the actors succeed in taking us into this world, occasionally with humor or insight. Still, “The Cherry Orchard” is a puzzle. Chekov does a good job getting us to ask, “Who are these people?” and “What motivates them?” Less clear is an answer to the question: “Why should I care about them?” Some are supposed to have found great meaning here. Others won’t, but with this production, at least they can wait for the next dance number.

A tip of the hat to narrator and actors Rosemarie Kingfisher, Lyla Elmassian, JoAnn Amos, Ashlyn Kelley, Alexandra Jiongo, Connor Pratt, Matthew Lindberg, Renee Hardin, Anna Leach, Ian Webb, Cassandra Slagle, Kyle Ryan and James DeSoto.

Performances resume tonight through April 26. For tickets, click here.

(L to R) Matthew Heredia, Cooper Bennett, Marcos Rivas Sanchez and Clarissa Evans. Photo by Tom Chown

By Robert Digitale

If I ever have to leave my homeland and make a new life in another country, I’d like to have someone like Juan José accompany me.

The protagonist of Santa Rosa Junior College’s latest theater production seems a good-hearted companion when encountering the bad and the beautiful of a new land. In “American Night: The Ballad of Juan José,” he finds himself dreaming of a U.S. history that encompasses the whacky, the vulgar, the brave and the heartbreaking. It’s all part of his search for answers that can help him pass the all-important exam for becoming a U.S citizen.

Friday’s opening night succeeded because the cast was able to regularly blend comedy and pathos in a jumble of history lessons: the Mexican-American War, the Lewis & Clark expedition, the Manzanar War Relocation Center, which confined 10,000 Japanese Americans during World War II. Along the way, Juan José meets Jackie Robinson, major league baseball’s first African American player, and Australian immigrant Harry Bridges, who helped form the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

Cast member Marcos Rivas Sanchez effortlessly embodies the wide-eyed Juan José, a modern-day stranger in a strange land. In his cross-cultural encounters, he displays enough Forrest Gump innocence to get away with calling Lewis & Clark’s Native American guide “Saca-chihuahua.” And yet the former Mexican policeman is wise enough to realize it would have been soul-sucking to take bribes from drug cartels but still fatal to refuse the money. With few options, he runs for asylum to the U.S. and gets a green card. He becomes one of the nation’s millions of invisible immigrants. It’s not enough. He needs to become an American citizen so that his wife and infant son can join him.

The play, originally commissioned by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, reminds us of that striking American notion: that all people are created equal and “endowed by their Creator” with such unalienable rights as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Juan José’s journey points out that too often we fail to live up to that ideal. But still it captures our imagination and raises the stakes in the struggle that Juan José embarks upon. Because the country his child inherits, our children will inherit, too.

Kudos to Director Reed Martin and cast members Raina Pope, Danny Banales, Tia Starr, Sam Spurling, Jimmy Toro Ruano, Matthew Heredia, Allegra O’Rourke, Cooper Bennett, Clarisa Evans, Jose Luis del Toro Jr. and Travis Philipsen.

The play resumes Wednesday through Sunday March 15. For tickets and show times, click here.

Next come the musical “Footloose,” which runs April 17 through May 3.

“Heroines,” photo by David Papas

If you can’t find the operetta you want, build the operetta that works for you.

That’s the idea behind Sonoma State University’s “Heroines,” which opened Thursday at the Everett B. Person Theatre. The college has a wealth of talented young female voices, so instructors Lynne Morrow and Jane Erwin Hammett decided to take songs from a variety of works from the 1880s to the 1930s  in order to put together the many roles needed.

The result becomes a story of multiple heroines mysteriously brought together and embarking on a journey for equality and independence in a man’s world.

To enjoy this endeavor, it helps to bring a certain mindset, especially for those whose grasp of operetta may start and end with “The Pirates of Penzance.” The new show becomes something of an archeological dig, taking you back to an earlier era of lyrics and melody. In such exploration you encounter new beauty but also may pass the seemingly musty in order to make discoveries and connections. (For me, one eye-opener came in grasping where Bobby Darin’s “Mack the Knife” character came from, namely “The Threepenny Opera.” Also eye opening was the thought that Bobby Darin may seem as ancient to a younger generation as the “Threepenny Opera.”)

Thursday’s performance worked best when the cast took risks. Sarah Maxon as “Mad” Margaret stole several early scenes with a zany knack for the unexpected.

Also appearing are Anna Leach, Canela Fullbright McCoubrey, Emily Thomason, Corynne Scott, Allison Spencer, Kelly Brodie, Sarah Louise Durham, Laura Henry, Emily Rice, Katherine Chilidonia and Nora Griffin. Joining them in the roles of “Man 1″ and “Man 2″ are Rodrigo Castillo and Peter Reinman.

The performances continue tonight and run through Feb. 15. For times and tickets, click here.

– Robert Digitale

Cheerily carols the lark

Over the cot.

On a sidewalk, blue Sunday mornin’

Lies a body just oozin’ life

You know when that shark bites with his teeth, babe

Scarlet billows start to spread

In short, there is a moment when you realize that you are watching a great conjuring, a theatrical illusion whose magic defies easy explanation. You stare, you try vainly to take it all in and you realize that somehow you are being transported – if not exactly to Paris 1881, then still to a place that no other medium could quite take you.

Photo by Tom Chown

Rare is the effect as stunning as in this production, especially for those who heretofore couldn’t fully connect with Broadway’s longest-running musical. You still may not grasp all the character motivations or the tale’s dramatic ending. But rest assured that those who enjoy stagecraft will leave with a sense that they have witnessed a dazzlingly new high-water mark in Sonoma County community theater.

The college Theatre Arts department certainly knew it was attempting to pull off what Chairwoman Laura Downing-Lee is calling “a landmark event.” Downing-Lee told a packed house at Thursday night’s opening that “Phantom” amounts to the largest single production in the department’s history and a fitting show for the 75th anniversary of the college’s Burbank Auditorium.

With its score by Andrew Lloyd Webber, “Phantom” tells the tale of a disfigured, murderous and almost supernatural musical genius who haunts a 19th Century Paris opera house. He falls in love with and is determined to make a star of a beautiful and gifted young singer there. The opera house’s wealthy patron also will come to love the same woman. Take it for granted that someone isn’t going to get the girl.

Here is a show said to be so demanding that the production double cast three of the leads in order to ensure that their voices won’t get strained. (Two professional tenors also share the role of Piangi in order to allow for scheduling conflicts.)

It’s hard to know how much the actors’ projection is helped by today’s modern sound systems. But on Thursday it was positively jaw dropping to hear such voices. Megan Fleischmann as the young singer Christine and Stacy Rutz as Carlotta sang with remarkable beauty even as they reached high notes that to the untrained ear seemed just a few steps below where crystal should be shattering. And the men, Anthony Guzman as the Phantom, Matthew Billings as the opera house patron Raoul, and Peter Benecke as Piangi all displayed a power and musicality that was stirring to hear.

(I’d love to hear about the performance of Saturday’s leads: Ezra Hernandez as the Phantom, Carmen Mitchell as Christine, Lani Basich as Carlotta and Mark Kratz as Piangi. Perhaps a gentle reader will so inform me.)

“Phantom” remains a spectacle, but under the guidance of director John Shillington the cast members breathed life into this tale and kept it moving steadily to its climax. Dance Captain Joseph Favalora and the four-member “corps de ballet” brought an extra flourish to the various operas performed as the story unfolds.

Scenic designer Peter Crompton has devised a gorgeous set with semi-complete columns and walls for the opera house. It’s as if the building has been partially peeled back to remind us that all is not at it appears.

Costume designer Maryanne Scozzari splendidly outfitted the cast for three separate operas, as well as the look of 1880s-era Paris. (You can read more about her impressive work for “Phantom” in an article here by my colleague Chris Smith.)

And the orchestra under conductor Janis Dunson Wilson gave a polished energy to the score, from bouncy opera pieces to Broadway-style crescendos to staccato synthesizers and the organ’s dread-filled cadence, the “Phantom’s” calling card.

Everyone involved in this production can take great satisfaction in what they already have accomplished. It ranks as a must-see show for anyone who fancies musical theater and wonders what heights a local company can attain.

Nine performances remain at the college’s Burbank Auditorium. The production resumes this Friday at 8 p.m. and continues through Dec. 7 with a selection of matinee and evening performances. For ticket information, click here.

– Robert Digitale