San Lorenzo Valley kicked off their highly anticipated spring showcase of Chicago over this past weekend.
Chicago is an American musical written by Fred Ebb and Bob Fosse based off the 1926 play of the same name. The play is set in Chicago during the jazz age, narrated by reporter Maurine Dallas Watkins, about real criminals and crimes on which she reported. The story is a parody on corruption in the administration of criminal justice and challenges the theory of the “celebrity criminal”. The original Broadway show opened in 1975 and ran for a total of 936 performances, ending in 1977. Bob Fosse began choreographing the show in 1979 and ran for 600 total performances. Fosse’s style of dancing is strongly recognized with the show. Chicago was revived on Broadway in 1996, and holds the record as the longest-running musical revival and the longest-running American musical in Broadway history. It is currently the second longest-running show to ever run on Broadway, just behind The Phantom of the Opera. Chicago has been put on in many countries around the world, A film adaptation of the musical was made in 2002 won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
With Chicago being so accredited, it made perfect sense for SLV to want to put their student’s skills to the test with this production. Ross Kooi, a senior at SLV, attended the show on opening night. Ross had this to say about the show, “ I really enjoyed the singing and dancing, the acting was really good too. It was all around a great play. And Kayla Penny, man she was amazing. Her acting and dancing were great, but her voice really put her over the top. She was really on another level. Kayla Penny, also a senior at SLV, played Matron ¨Mama¨ Morton. Kayla had this to say about being part of the show, ¨Getting to be a part of such a supportive cast and crew has honestly been my favorite part. Everyone is so helpful all the time. Although I have not been apart of the theatre family for a very long at all, I can fairly say that this group in particular is so special to me and so comforting which has allowed me to really be myself in a whole new environment while pushing myself out of my comfort zone, and still have the best time with so many others who are just happy to be apart of the show.¨
It was a great performance by the SLV drama and hopefully you got to see it! If you didn’t there is always next year with another musical.
By Braidan Lewis
The Claw 