Kidney Shilling
On December 7th, I talked to Mariah Ryland and Luke Malott from BISFA’s Theater department. With theater being one of our biggest departments, they have a lot going on for this year's Holiday Spec and we at the Phantom wanted to know all about it!
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Kidney Shilling: Before we get started with questions, could you both introduce yourselves and tell us your grade?
Mariah Ryland: Okay. Hi my name is Mariah Ryland and I’m a senior.
Luke Malott: Hi I’m Luke Malott and I’m also a senior.
Kidney Shilling: Okay, wonderful. Now since you both are a part of the theater department, what will you be doing for Holiday Spectacular?
Mariah Ryland: Um, I will be in Hot Chocolate [From The Polar Express by Glen Ballard] as a tapper and we’re still working stuff out. But we, um, are also doing like different songs like, um, some of our other songs are Winter Weather [by Ted Shapiro], and we’re doing a mashup of Lightwind Candle [by Peter Yarrow] and Somewhere in My Memory [by John Williams and Leslie Bricusse]. And we’re also doing a little play as well.
Luke Malott: So we actually, this year, we have a co-written student play and we have a cute little scene for our song Lightwind Candle. And this year the goal of the theater department is to include cultural representation of all holiday’s, not just Christmas, because we understand that not everyone celebrates Christmas. So we’re including some stuff for Hanukkah. I know we’re having a little SlideShow of the different holidays that people celebrate. And I think Kwanzaa’s gonna be on there, I think Winter Solstice is gonna be on there, [I] think Hanukkah’s gonna be on there. Um, so we’re having a really nice, well-rounded representation of all holiday’s this year.
Mariah Ryland: Yes, um, that was a really big focus for us this year, so.
Kidney Shilling: Awesome!
Luke Malott: Yeah! But, so this year for Lightwind Candle seniors are actually gonna start it off this year. And there’s gonna be nine of us and it’s, uh, gonna be a bit of representation of the Hanukkah Menorah. So, we’re, um uh, one of our sopranos is gonna start us off with a solo. We're still deciding on who’s, uh, gonna be our senior soloist this year for Lightwind Candle. And so, um, after that then the seniors are gonna stand up and be singing. I think we’re gonna have really nice outfits too, I think our little theme is we’re gonna go with a nice blue. So, I think we’re all really excited to color coordinate on that one, um…
Mariah Ryland: I think all of us, especially the seniors, but, like, we’re all very excited for Holiday Spectacular.
Kidney Shilling: Awesome! That actually, kind of, leads me into my next question. How does it feel that this is your last Holiday Spectacular?
Luke Malott: Honestly, Mariah go first, I can’t.
Mariah Ryland: Okay, um, I think it’s really exciting. I always love whatever dance numbers we do, I think they’re always a lot of fun. Um, I’m very excited for O Holy Night [by Placide Cappeau]. We had those auditions today. So I think we’re all very excited. I think, as seniors, it makes us look back on our freshman year of Holiday Spectacular and the Holiday Spectacular last year, um, and just think about all of the good memories we’ve made during rehearsals. Um, you know, on stage, um, back stage and just it’s always just a really great bonding experience. You know, our freshman year I think that was, one of, like our first big bonding performances that really brought us all together.
Luke Malott: Yeah, and Holiday Spectacular has been really different for us throughout the years.
Mariah Ryland: Definitely.
Luke Malott: And we have had three different directors as [the] class of 23’ in the theater department. So, for us it’s been a really, incredibly, different experience. For example, last year, um, or not last year, freshman year. Um, the way our department was structured was at the end of the day we had different ensembles. So, for Holiday Spec, each of those ensembles would get to present different numbers and so my freshman year, I was actually in both ensembles and I got to be a part of all my department's numbers. So, it was actually really, really, fun to see it all come together and just, just in that week's span of time, at towards the end of the, uh, towards the end of our school year for that year, we just really got to collab. Not only with each other, in each of our ensembles, but um, as upperclassmen and underclassmen. And I think that was probably our biggest experience. Then sophomore year, as I’m sure most of you know, COVID happened and we didn’t really get to have the Holiday Spec experience again. So, as sophomores, um, we were introduced to a, two things, we were introduced to a dance number, um, I think it was Sparkle Jolly Jingle Jingle Jinglie that year. And we also did a, um, we… uh, yes! We did a play! We did a short play and it was about COVID Christmas and how living with COVID during Christmas really is. So, I think that was really relatable for all of us. And then last year, we had, um, we kinda’ had a mosh-posh of a lot of stuff. We had another short play and we did a few more numbers. So it’s been very different, extremely different, every single year that we’ve done this but, I think this year is probably going to have to be one of my favorites because we’ve got some much going on, and, um, it’s just gonna be really exciting to see it all come together.
Kidney Shilling: Awesome. Now, Mariah, you did mention you had to audition for O Holy Night solos, were there any other audition processes for any of the other acts that you guys are in?
Mariah Ryland: Yes, definitely! Winter weather was really close, cause we had a dance audition for that and it was very close and it just shows you every person dancing up there is amazing.
Luke Malott: So, um, I can actually speak on a lot of this. We had several things that we had to audition for. So number 1 was Hot Chocolate, that’s hopefully going to be our big Act 1 show-stopper. So Hot Chocolate is going to be big this year, razzle-dazzle. We have multiple sections, I know the jazz band is going to be on stage performing. We have this cute little candy train that’s going to be woven through our set of tappers, we also have tappers this year. And we’re also going to have people perform in the isles. But we are super excited that we are going to be able to collab with jazz band for that number. And I remember that was an audition process in itself. Due to our last fall show, Puffs, um, some of us really weren’t able to be there for the learning process. So we got a class or two to pick that up, and then, um, after that our choreographer, Mrs.Ruark, she made a decision about who would be what in that number. And Mariah’s actually one of our tappers and I’m an understudy tapper. But I’m hoping everyone does really well for that, so that I can model after just in case anyones sick [for the performance]. For Winter Weather we had dance auditions for, not only the Rockette part of the number but our partnering too. So we have six partnering couples and we also have ten Rockette’s.
Mariah Ryland: Yes, ten Rockette’s and two understudies. It’s really cool with Hot Chocolate to be able to collaborate with the jazz band again. They always give a really great accompaniment.
Luke Malott: But Winter Weather we have solos at the beginning that we had to audition for. Other than that, our Lightwind Candle piece is also going to be combined with Somewhere in my Memory, which I believe is from Home Alone. But yeah, we’re all super excited. There’s been a lot of time for people to get out there and make sure their face is featured this year.
Kidney Shilling: Now Luke, you also mentioned how the process has been going with having a bunch of different teachers throughout the years. Are you guys excited to have Mr.Ryan as your teacher for your last Holiday Spec.
Luke Malott: Mariah Ryland:
Absolutely! Absolutely!
Mariah Ryland: Yeah, I think that, like Luke was mentioning before, having different perspectives on it. I don’t think we could, like there’s no “one is better” than the other. I feel like we are able to trust him to help us put on a great show.
Luke Malott: We are so happy to have him here. He has honestly been a huge blessing. After coming off of our fall show, he worked it in to have certain people step up and be there for the Holiday show. Because I know me personally, I was lead in the fall show and coming down from that I did not have much recollection of what to do for many of our holiday numbers. And the fact that I was even given the gift of being an understudy for Hot Chocolate is huge. Because I’ve had those other people who maybe haven’t gotten really to shine bright thus far, help me along the way. And hopefully this Holiday Spec will give them a chance to be like, “this is my chance! This is my number and I’m in the front and I’m tapping and everyone’s gonna see me”.
Mariah Ryland: I’d say there are a lot of people who have really, um, like stepped up and they’re really gonna shine. Like people who haven’t really gotten that chance before, I’d say that we’re all very proud of those people and everyone who’s working hard. And it’s really cool because then we get to see many different faces and show what they’re great at and show what we all love to do.
Kidney Shilling: Okay, now with Holiday Spec being two weeks away [as of this interview], have you guys started going through the process of getting set up for each piece, i.e blocking, and if so what is the process?
Luke Malott: Currently we still have a couple of numbers that we still have to work, blocking wise and placement. We haven’t really worked Lightwind Candle and Somewhere in my Memory. Hot Chocolate and Winter Weather Mrs.Ruark is killing it. She’s got both of those pieces choreographed, she’s got placements, she knows what she’s doing. So honestly I would not be surprised if those pieces are blocked and completed by the end of the week. I think personally I know I’m not going to get to be in Winter Weather and hopefully, hopefully, I won’t get to be in Hot Chocolate because I would like to see everyone on that stage performing. I don’t want someone to get sick around that time ‘cause I know how much effort everyone puts into that number. So I’m hoping I’ll get to see that as well. Those are probably some of my main highlights for getting to see the Holiday Spec every year. And I think placement and blocking right now, we still need to get that into gear but once we do everything will come together.
Mariah Ryland: Yeah, I think we’re really starting to get going, like “Okay, we’ve got this done and this done and this”. And we’re all working very hard because of our full show and we’ve been working it little by little and it’s starting to get going. We’ve got the dance number choreographed, we’re almost finished learning our musical pieces. And then, especially once we start rehearsing on stage, we are actually in the process of setting up some after school rehearsals.
Kidney Shilling: Awesome! How long have you guys been working on Holiday Spectacular this year?
Luke Malott: I think it’s different for every person. I know personally I didn’t see Holiday Spectacular stuff this year, I think our last day for Puffs was [November] 6th, so maybe the second week of November is probably the first time I saw Holiday Spec. Which for me is normally really, really late. I know last year I started seeing that stuff as far as early October late September. And another change that has been brought to Holiday Spec this year is chamber choir. That wasn’t here the last two years. Some of our upperclassmen MT’s [Musical Theater Student’s] and one of our sophomore MT’s [Musical Theater Student’s] has actually gone into chamber choir and we are rehearsing things with them for Holiday Spectacular. We always rehearse the closer plus the opener. Our opener this year is actually Three Ships [by Williams Sandys] and our closer is always O Holy Night.
Mariah Ryland: Yeah, I’d say for me, I feel like I kind of was put in a pretty lucky situation because I had a bit of a smaller featured part in Puffs I was able to switch between Puffs and Holiday Spec material. I think it’s just been different for everyone. And it’s been different than last year because we didn’t have a fall show. So our first dance audition [for Holiday Spec] was the second or third week of school. But we’re very thankful for our fall play because it’s given us more opportunities to perform and I think we’re just figuring out the balance between the two.
Kidney Shilling: Wonderful. Thank-you both for having this interview with me and we look forward to seeing you both in Holiday Spectacular this year!
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