{"id":75459,"date":"2013-04-17T09:03:56","date_gmt":"2013-04-17T13:03:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=75459"},"modified":"2013-04-24T09:12:56","modified_gmt":"2013-04-24T13:12:56","slug":"when-lights-go-up-onstage-broadway-stars-are-in-storrs-spotlight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2013\/04\/when-lights-go-up-onstage-broadway-stars-are-in-storrs-spotlight\/","title":{"rendered":"When Lights Go Up Onstage, Broadway Stars Are in Storrs Spotlight"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pat<\/a>
Pat Sajak (left) starred as Felix Ungar opposite Joe Moore’s Oscar Madison in the Neil Simon classic ‘The Odd Couple’ at the Connecticut Repertory Theatre. Sajak, the longtime host of ‘Wheel of Fortune,’ is just one of the stars who has been seen in Storrs.\u00a0 (Gerry Goodstein for UConn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As befits his position as artistic director and head of the Department of Dramatic Arts in the School of Fine Arts, Vincent Cardinal is a storyteller.<\/p>\n

Cardinal recounts that while at the Student Union last summer, he overheard someone say: \u201cI had the strangest thing happen. I was at a restaurant and I saw a guy who looks just like Pat Sajak!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt cracked me up,\u201d says Cardinal, who at the time was directing the longtime host of \u201cWheel of Fortune\u201d in the role of Felix Unger in Neil Simon\u2019s \u201cThe Odd Couple\u201d at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts. \u201cYou don\u2019t think you\u2019ll see a celebrity around in our little downtown.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Storrs Center continues to grow, Cardinal says there will be more celebrity sightings, as the Connecticut Repertory Theatre (CRT) and other performances and exhibitions that are part of the School of Fine Arts increasingly attract audiences from throughout the region.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor a lot of people in Connecticut, the front door to this University is athletics, but I think for a growing number the front door is the arts,\u201d he says. \u201cI see a large population getting to know the University because they come to see a play and spend a day on campus and discover we are multifaceted and have multi-levels of excellence on this campus. Any university at its best is a vital intellectual, artistic, and recreational community.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Terrence<\/a>
Terrence Mann (left) as Don Quixote with UConn SFA alum Richard Ruiz as Sancho Panza in Connecticut Repertory Theatre’s Nutmeg Summer series production of Man of La Mancha. (Gerry Goodstein for UConn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The performance last year by Sajak in \u201cThe Odd Couple\u201d followed the CRT production of \u201cMan of La Mancha,\u201d which starred the veteran Broadway actor Terrence Mann. CRT has also provided opportunities to present regional debuts and premieres of new plays by playwrights such as Mike Reiss (\u201cI’m Connecticut\u201d), Theresa Rebeck (\u201cO Beautiful\u201d), Stephen Svoboda (\u201cOdysseus D.O.A.\u201d), and Simon Stephens (\u201cPunk Rock\u201d).<\/p>\n

Cardinal says UConn has established a reputation as a place where actors, directors, and writers in the performing arts \u2013 including many who have won prestigious Tony and Emmy Awards \u2013 have opportunities not available to them elsewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheater people just like to do theater,\u201d he says. \u201cWhat\u2019s happening with our summer program in particular is that a lot of famous people who want to work together, really seasoned Broadway folks, don\u2019t get to pick and choose who they get to work with. What happens is a group of people say: Wouldn\u2019t it be fun to do this show together? I wonder whether the Connecticut people will let us?\u201d<\/p>\n

When that happens, such collaborations benefit the Eastern Connecticut audiences who enjoy the performances and the UConn students who have the opportunity to work as actors and backstage support crews alongside of accomplished stage actors. More often than not, especially during the academic year, when heralded performers arrive in Storrs they also spend time in the classroom with students and faculty sharing their wealth of experience and knowledge.<\/p>\n

\"Vince<\/a>
Vince Cardinal, artistic director and head of the Department of Dramatic Arts, has the dual roles of department head and artistic director for all CRT productions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When the lights go up on opening night at any of UConn\u2019s three performance stages \u2013 the Harriet Jorgensen Theatre, Nafe Katter Theatre, and the Studio Theatre \u2013 it is the culmination of months of planning, set construction and rehearsals that bring together dozens of students, faculty, and backstage collaborators. It is a year-round process that brings together actors, directors, set designers, casting directors, costume makers, craftsmen, and musicians to produce nine shows each year.<\/p>\n

Even as shows are on stage, there is planning for the next season of performances, with an eye toward meeting both artistic and educational goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are several balls in the air at all times,\u201d says Cardinal, who has the dual roles of department head and artistic director for the productions. \u201cWhat would serve what our students need to learn as well as our local community? There is the joy theater brings, but there is also the edification, stimulation, and challenge, and the financial reality that you have to sell tickets to keep the thing going to accomplish the first two missions.\u201d<\/p>\n

One way the dual goals are accomplished, he says, is by having a theme for the season of shows that is detailed in the CRT program as the \u201cArtistic Director\u2019s Note.\u201d For the 2012-2013 season, the productions center on how the nation\u2019s youth often are caught between political and social battles. Early productions this season included \u201cO Beautiful,\u201d a contemporary story of today\u2019s politically polarized age; and \u201cRomeo & Juliet,\u201d Shakespeare\u2019s classic love story of teenagers from feuding households. Recent productions include \u201cPunk Rock,\u201d set at a British boarding school; and upcoming is \u201cHairspray,\u201d the award-winning musical about the transformation of an outsider into a teen celebrity, which runs from April 25 to May 5.<\/p>\n

Getting the word out<\/b><\/p>\n

The word about UConn\u2019s performing arts is going beyond Eastern Connecticut via traditional news outlets and social media, Cardinal says, with Internet postings on Facebook and through Twitter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a record number of kids coming in and auditioning,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen we ask why they are here, they\u2019ve been following rehearsals online, they know who our kids are. There was a time when you would build a beautiful show and nobody but our audience would see the set. Now word gets out and Playbill <\/i>calls and wants pictures to feature us on their website, or the Associated Press does a story with international reach. Our little shows that used to be hidden in the Quiet Corner reach an international audience consistently, which is great for the kids and for their futures and for our participation in the greater conversation of theater in the world. It\u2019s shrunk the community in a positive way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UConn theaters are drawing a steady stream of Broadway veterans to perform with students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":75767,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[55],"class_list":["post-75459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-30 06:49:00","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75459"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75459\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76719,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75459\/revisions\/76719"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/75767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75459"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=75459"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=75459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}