The show must go on

The spring musical will look a little different this year at Bay Port High School, with the NFL Draft taking place during the school’s usual opening weekend, but the show — Godspell — will go on.

“In a normal school year, we would perform our show over two weekends, usually the last weekend in April and the first weekend in May,” said Jaclyn Beattie, the show’s director. “However, we realized that Green Bay was having quite a big event the last weekend in April, so we had to adjust our calendar this year. And because we limited the number of weekends that we’re doing the show down to one because of the Draft, we decided to go with a smaller show.”

This scaled back production is a stark contrast to last year’s show, The Wizard of Oz.

“Last year, [The Wizard of Oz] was a huge, huge undertaking,” Beattie said. “This show is much smaller. We decided for the first time in many years to go with a smaller cast — obviously, because it’s a smaller show so there’s not as many parts.”

But taking on a smaller show has meant Beattie and the students working on the show have been able to try out ideas that haven’t been possible with their large shows in the past.

“It gave us some opportunities to do some more unique things with our set and since it has a much smaller pit band, we decided this year that we’re going to include the band a little bit more…” Beattie said. “We got to be a little bit more creative with some of the things that we got to do.”

And the students have embraced the new look to their spring musical season, working tirelessly over the last four months to make sure everything will be perfect on opening night.

“Their commitment is unbelievable,” Beattie said. “We start our auditions right away when we get back to school from Christmas break, so we literally start at the beginning of January and we have had rehearsals almost every day from then until now. These kids are putting in so much time and so much commitment. And it’s not just the cast — it’s our crew members and our costuming kids and our pit band that have put in an incredible amount of work and they have such amazing dedication. They blow me away every time.”

Beyond the dedication of the students involved, Beattie hopes those who attend the show will see the values it encompasses.

“This show definitely has an incredible message, and with the way our world is right now — so divided and just kind of a downer — the main message of the show is to basically love your neighbor,” she said. “I’m hoping the kids have kind of recognized that and that they’ve become a really close-knit group… The whole story is teaching the gospel of Matthew and a lot of parables from the Bible and things like that.”

Performances of Godspell will take place April 30, May 1 and May 2 at 7 p.m. and May 3 at 2 p.m.

Tickets and more information can be found at bayport.hssdschools.org/about-us/pac.