Kate Gabrielsen (Eurydice) and Will Emerson (Orpheus) perform a scene during a recent rehearsal for Hadestown. Photo by Donna MacKenzie
Adaptations of two Greek myths might seem an unlikely source for a Broadway musical, but Hadestown proved that they can still resonate with today’s audiences when presented in a different way.
HF-L High School students will perform Hadestown Teen Edition this weekend on Thursday, March 27 and Friday, March 28 at 7:30 p.m. and on Saturday, March 29 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. at the District Auditorium at the Middle School on Quaker Meeting House Road. Tickets are $10 students and $14 general. You can purchase tickets at seatyourself.biz/hflcsd.
Hadestown tells a version of the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Eurydice, a young girl who is poor and looking for something to eat, goes to work in a hellish industrial version of the Greek underworld run by the Greek god Hades to escape the poverty and cold and her poor singer-songwriter lover Orpheus comes to rescue her. The Greek god Hermes opens the show by welcoming the audience and introducing the story, characters, ensemble and band. Eurydice and the Fates describe the cold weather and famine of the setting. Orpheus, Hermes’s ward introduces himself to Eurydice and asks her to marry him. She is skeptical since both are poor but Orpheus says he is writing a song to make spring come again so they won’t have to struggle. He tells the story of Hades and Persephone. Persephone arrives in the world above to celebrate summer and Eurydice begins to fall in love with Orpheus. Hades come early to collect Persephone and take her back to Hadestown, Hades’ underground factory. Although she is told about the harsh conditions the factory workers labor under, Eurydice is intrigued by the praises sung by the Fates and the promise of protection that Hadestown offers. The cold weather returns and Eurydice becomes more desperate as times grow harder. After Persephone and Hades argue, Hades leaves Hadestown to find someone who will appreciate its safety and security and finds Eurydice. He invites her to come to Hadestown and the Fates urge her to join him. She sees no other choice and goes with Hades. Orpheus discovers she is gone and decides to rescue her using Hermes’ instruction on how to get there. Is he able to rescue Eurydice? That will be revealed in Act 2.
“I’m deeply connected to the myth of Orpheus as I performed in two opera settings of the story,” HF-L artistic director CJ Tomaszewski said. “One of them was Orpheus in the Underworld, an operetta by French composer Jacques Offenbach. My final senior scene study was Hadestown at NYU. We were asked what character we wanted to explore and I put down Orpheus and a friend put down Eurydice. We were paired together for the scene study. We researched it, saw the show, blocked the scenes and then performed it for our classmates. It was very powerful to direct and block those scenes. When I became the artistic director here last year, I knew as soon as possible that I wanted the kids to do this show. The rights became available last year and my colleagues had seen it when it came through at RBTL and they agreed that it would be a good show for the students.”
The HF-L cast features Will Emerson as Orpheus, Kate Gabrielsen as Eurydice, Mikey Ruff as Hermes, Zach Boehm as Hades, Jenna Quinn as Persephone, Amelia Somers, Kaylee Henshaw and Ava Youngblut (The Songbirds) and Claire Connors, Maeve Connors and Taber Gloor (The Rattlesnakes) as the Fates, and Nora Anderson, Raegan Banker, Adeline Beutner, Mairen Butler, Anneleise Corey, Elias Courtney, Peterah Deisenroth, Kayla Donner, Kai Ferraro, Madison Fleming, Andy Fosler, Grace Francis, Will Gabrielsen, Simon Guckenbiehl, Shailyn Hanrahan, Samantha Healy, Olivia Jacobs, Max Jacopille-Bornheimer, Sophia Jacopille-Bornheimer, Emma Kingsley, Macy Letendre, Paige Moscicki, Skyler Myers, Siobhan Neenan, Alannah Orr, Dari Osso-Gomez, Teagan O’Connor, Emily Repass, Madalyne Sousou, Bria Torpey, Luke Washburn and MacKenna Weaver (Workers Chorus). Sousou was the Dance Captain and Myers the Assistant Dance Captain.
Because this is Hadestown Teen Edition, there are some modifications to the show that differ from the production which premiered on Broadway in 2019 and won eight Tony Awards, including Best Musical.
“It is very minimally modified from the Broadway show,” Tomaszewski said. “Some of the keys and ranges in the music have been changed to accommodate kids’ voices. The other change is the workers chorus was expanded and is featured in more songs so the ensemble can participate more. In addition, we doublecast the Fates because we had a lot of talent and all six offered unique takes on the Fates during auditions.”
Students working on the show behind the scenes are KK Frame and Kayla Wells (student directors), Megan Parrish (assistant student director), Schuyler Herbert and Fred Kirkwood (stage managers), Adrien Abraham, Amy Bianchi, Olivia Dack, Ellie Davis, Abby Flagg, Ash Ford, Emeline Good, Evie Ha, Eva Jackson, Arianna Jones, Finley Neenan, Hazel Jokl, Jenna Lawrence, Scarlett Pfeffer, Leah Rodgers and Bria Torpey (costumes), Lydia Borgesen, Katie Krebbeks, Hannah Miller, Juliette Shaffer, Madison Spaulding and Devyn Stanley (hair/makeup), Tiger Comstock, Olivia Henderson, Jacob Moscicki and Gianna Woodcock (lighting), Kate Gabrielsen, Kaylee Henshaw, Arianna Jones, Dari Osso-Gomez, Mikey Ruff, Horia Shaheed and Sophia Woodcock (publicity), Emma Barnhardt, Donald Cooper, Noelani Kim and Sarah McLaughlin (props), Owen Boggio, Lita Brady, Reese Carter, Abram Courtney, Easton Curcio, Natalie McDonald and Sam Roth (sound) and Abby Blakeney, Ellie Camp, Madeline Conklin, Adam Depuy, Jorja Harvey, Parker Kester, Lucy Kirkwood, Abbi Maylin, Maddie Peters, Casey Pribanich, Alessandro Pringle, Evelyn Rose, Smith Schaefer, Izzy Torres and Noah Wells (stage crew).
For many of the students onstage, music and theatre at HF-L have played a big part in their young lives with this show being the fourth musical for many of the seniors.
Boehm, a senior, was in the ensemble for HF-L’s productions of Les Miserables and Guys and Dolls and last year had the role of Bill Austin in Mamma Mia! This year, he plays Hades and the way he approached this role was very different than the way he approached the role of Bill Austin.
“They are two completely different characters,” Boehm said. “With Mamma Mia!, you could have fun and it would work. With Hades, I tried to go more in depth and think about what he wants in each song and his mannerisms and characterizations. With Bill, I could let loose and do whatever and it would work. So, Hades has been more organized in a way. I have liked the roles I had in all four shows for different reasons. Hades is definitely the biggest one I’ve had at HF-L and I have had a lot of fun with him. I hope the audience loves him as much as I do.”
The show has also brought several students out of their comfort zones as they have either learned an instrument that they have never played or they have taken on more of a leadership role.
Somers, a senior who has been in all four musicals at the high school, learned to play the ukulele.
“During Covid, I picked up the ukulele for fun but never had played it or performed with it,” she said. “So, it has definitely been interesting learning new instruments. I am also learning the violin, kind of, actually very little about the violin so it has been challenging learning new instruments.”
Gloor, a senior who is President of HF-L’s Drama Club, learned to play tenor banjo for the show.
“I’ve tried to learn a couple of different instruments for the show,” she said. “The very first one I tried was the trumpet for auditions. It was a lot of hard work. I played French horn when I was younger but I had never picked up the trumpet before. Everything is a learning process, being part of the shows and learning to express yourself onstage, learning to play an instrument, it just takes some hard work and some people who you really care about to motivate you to keep going. So when I started learning the tenor banjo, there was a couple of banjos that I was learning off of, it was a process of practicing on my own, practicing with people who knew what they were talking about and absorbing as much information as I can and I think that is really reflective of the show process as a whole, opening up whole different horizons.”
Sousou was a member of the ensemble for Guys and Dolls and Mamma Mia!. The senior, who was a competitive dancer for 10-12 years in jazz and lyrical and also some tap, was asked to be the Dance Captain for the show. She also was able to choreograph the dance for the song When The Chips Are Down.
So, what was it like to take on such as demanding leadership role?
“It was a big ask and I was pretty excited and I was not going to turn it down,” Sousou said. “I used to be a competitive dancer so I got inspiration for the choreography from past dances and teachers. I also watched videos of other schools who did Hadestown Teen Edition and I got inspiration from that and from the Broadway version. It’s been fun; everyone has been cooperative and amazing.”
Interestingly enough, the Broadway production of Hadestown has an HF-L connection.
Griffin Dohr, a 2011 HF-L graduate, was a co-producer of the show when it premiered on Broadway in 2019. He will be returning to Honeoye Falls this week to see his alma mater perform the show on closing night. During a phone interview earlier this week, he remembered when he heard that HF-L would be performing the show this year.
“I believe it was my mom who first told me,” Dohr said. “I think she had been at an event in Honeoye Falls and some members of the high school choir were singing. They mentioned that they would be doing Hadestown this spring and she told them them I was involved in the Broadway production. So, I looked it up and followed the Instagram page. The kids have asked me questions: when I graduated from HF-L, what I was involved with as far as clubs, sports, etc., how someone gets into co-producing a show, about my experience co-producing and even who my favorite character of the show was.”
When he first joined the show as co-producer, Dohr was told by many people that the show would not have staying power on the Great White Way.
“Everyone told me that it would be a flop and how it would not have legs,” said Dohr, who is currently involved as a co-producer for the show Smash, based on the television show produced by Stephen Spielberg now adapted for the stage and currently in previews on Broadway before its official opening on April 10th. “The show was raw and original and now, 5-and-a-half years later, it is still on Broadway so it did in fact have legs. There have been touring productions and since this is the Teen version, I am interested to see what alterations have been made. I am very proud to be part of the producing team for Hadestown and proud to be part of the HF-L community. Now, it is these two worlds crossing. It’s cool that I am going back to somewhere where I spent so much time and will be seeing something that I have been involved with for the past five-and-a-half years.”
The students also think it is extra-special to do a show that someone who graduated from HF-L has been a part of.
“It was so cool when we found out on Instagram,” said Ruff, a junior. “The show is so awesome because its themes are so prevalent and not only is the message great but the music is incredible and the dialogue is awesome. It’s even cooler that it is now at HF-L and that an HF-L grad helped originate it.”
While all the students interviewed for this article emphasized how much fun it has been, there have also been challenges to deal with as well.
Evie Ha, a senior who is the student leader of the costume crew, has worked on all four shows at the high school and said the design look of all four shows are very different. The challenge for this show was that it is the first year that the rights to it were available for high schools, so as the student costume designer working closely with the costume designer, she didn’t want to directly copy the Broadway show but still come up with the New Orleans jazz vibe of the show while making it fresh and original. Ha got involved in the costume crew when she heard from friends that the high school musical was coming up when she was a freshman. She had been on the publicity crew for the Middle School show and, while watching rehearsals for that show in the back of the auditorium, thought about how incredible it was watching the Middle School show come to life.
“I liked clothes and fashion and I knew how to sew,” said Ha, who wants to have a future in costume design. “Mrs. Fisher (the costume designer) is so smart and organized, compassionate and giving. She’ll teach you anything you want to know about costume design and my desire to be a costume designer is an outgrowth of my experience here.”
The production of Hadestown Teen Edition will mark the first time in 14 years that HF-L will be involved in the Rochester Broadway Theatre League’s Stars of Tomorrow program, which celebrates high school musicals in the Rochester area. Tomaszewski sent a survey to students and parents asking their thoughts on becoming involved again in the program and the response was a resounding yes.
Tomaszewski said that while the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice as well as that of Hades and Persephone, is from ancient Greek times, it still speaks to people today.
“It’s about sacrificing for love and seeing how the world could be and a better future,” Tomaszewski stated. “Orpheus understands the power of art and music and that resonates with me. It’s why I want to do this, introducing kids to music and directing shows.”
