[NEohioPAL] Baldwin Wallace Music Theater Students Bring Broadway Back to Beaumont School on April 25 & May 5

[Bruce Hennes]

*On Monday, April 25, the Baldwin Wallace Music Theater’s Junior Class will
do a tribute to Stephen Sondheim* at the black box theater on the campus of
Beaumont School in Cleveland Heights.  There will be one show at 7:00 pm
and tickets are $15 per person.  Directed by Vicky Bussert, the program
will include  songs from Sunday in the Park With George, Sweeney Todd,
Gypsy, Assassins and more.



On the heels of those tap shoes *just 11 days later, the Baldwin Wallace
Senior Class will do their signature Senior Showcase on Friday, May 6,*
also at Beaumont.  For months, the seniors have been rehearsing an
original, exciting, tightly-choreographed, non-stop theatrical production
to showcase each student in front of more than 200 Broadway casting
directors and agents who have the power to put them on stage in regional
touring productions, cruise ships, TV shows and movies - and the ultimate
goal for many - on the Broadway stage.

The *Senior Showcase* formally takes place in Manhattan in April, but the
students will reprise this program at Beaumont Friday, May 6 at 6:30 pm,
repeat that show 8:30 pm -- and at the very end, when they all join hands
and take that final bow, it will be the last time this group of students
ever appear together on a single stage.

For more than 15 years, the Senior Showcase was done on the Nighttown
stage, always an emotional experience for the kids, their parents – and the
audience, too.  This is a show you won't want to miss.



Both programs are joint productions of the Baldwin Wallace Music Theater
Department, Beaumont School and JWP Productions.  Both programs will also
feature an opening act.  To buy tickets, click here
<https://mailchi.mp/00ebd49f072e/nighttown-newsletter-music-still-alive-1239748?e=026f634855>
.   For group sales (minimum 10 tickets): call Bruce at 216-978-2047.



*Additional Background Information*

For more than a decade, Nighttown in Cleveland Heights was an integral part
of the Baldwin Wallace Music Theater Department’s curriculum, giving
students the opportunity to perform in a nightclub setting before a live
audience, similar to the experience they would encounter as working
artists. When Nighttown closed in 2020, it looked as though these budding
theater professionals might lose the opportunity to hone this important
aspect of their performance skills.  By luck and with connections, those
students have now found a new venue to test their craft: Beaumont School.

One of Cleveland's best-kept secrets is the fact that Beaumont School,
the all-girls Catholic high school in the Ursuline tradition that educates
women for life, leadership and service, located in Cleveland Heights,
houses a 147-seat "black box" theater, with professional sound and lights.
When Beaumont was contacted about the possibility of using the space as a
training ground for B-W’s musical theater students, Wendy Hoke, president
of Beaumont, readily agreed, noting the importance of American musical
theater and the Great American Songbook.

Jim Wadsworth and his JWP Productions, which handled all the music at
Nighttown, has been producing music events at a variety of venues in
Cleveland and Akron since Nighttown closed.  He notes the move to Beaumont
continues the Nighttown-Baldwin Wallace tradition, and again brings these
students to Cleveland’s east side.
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