Cabaret: Creating the Set

Jill Summers (bottom left) is the Technical Director here at Asheville Community Theatre. She's also designed many of the sets over the past few years, and has been working hard on the concept and build for Cabaret.

Jill shared her scenic model for Cabaret with the staff, cast, and crew a few weeks ago (top right). It's a two level set with a space between the grand staircases so that the orchestra can be seated onstage. It's grounded by a metal centerpiece (hence, the welding, top left) with wooden platforming, the beginnings of which are show on the bottom right. Of course, by the time Jill and her talented crew of carpenters and painters are through, the metal and the bare wood will be transformed into the Kit Kat Klub.

Cabaret: The Inside Scoop

That's me on the right! Lyle Laney is on the left,
Jessica Pisano (Sally Bowles) is center, and
Alan Malpass is on the floor!

Hi everyone, my name is Van Raynor and I am a marketing intern for ACT. I am also in this years production of Cabaret. Jenny Bunn and I thought that we would give you an inside scoop on what is happening behind the scenes of Cabaret.

If you have never seen the show, Cabaret is set in Berlin in the 1920s during the rise of Nazi Germany. The show takes place in the debaucherous Kit Kat Klub with a wide variety of interesting (and very flexible, I might add) club dancers. Cliff Bradshaw, an American writer, comes to the city in the search of inspiration for his book. He goes to the "Klub" where he meets Sally Bowles, a British singer. The characters face many new challenges and decisions that will change their lives maybe for the better, maybe for the worse as they move into the new political climate.

This sizzling show directed by Jerry Crouch will be sure to keep you warm in the month of February. The cast of 15 who have various backgrounds in acting, dancing and singing, have been rehearsing since December in preparation of opening night on the 7th of February 2014. We are all excited to get this show up on its feet! Our almost nightly rehearsals have left some of us - and I can testify to this - sore and out of breath because of the tough dance steps our choreographer Kathy Myers has given us. Just wait for some of the lifts and routines we have waiting for you at the "Klub!" And if that isn't enough we have Lenora Thom as our Music Director which as anyone who's worked with her before knows that she will get you singing to a German efficiency. Director Jerry Crouch has been taking candid pictures of the rehearsals for the past few weeks and we thought we would show you a few to get you in that Cabaret spirit!

Scenes from a musical - or at least the rehearsals!