Coming Up: Lend Me A Tenor

When sensational opera singer Tito Merelli arrives in town, everyone goes wild! With Tito’s surprising appearance comes a whirlwind of romance, drama, and comedy! This sensational play written by Ken Ludwig stars Tito Merelli, his wife Maria, a fancy gala owner by the name of Bernadette Saunders, her daughter Maggie, her boyfriend Max, Julia, the chairwoman of the gala, Diana, a soprano who will do anything to become famous, and of course, the eager and slightly pushy Bellhop! When Tito’s wife leaves him right before his expected performance, he takes an extra stomach pill due to his misery and passes out. When Tito is presumed dead and his wife’s letter is confused for a suicide note, Bernadette gets herself and her gala into a lot of trouble! A different, unexpected, performer disguised as Tito takes his place, and things go awry, especially when everyone realizes Tito isn’t dead!

 In this captivating play, you’ll find comedy, romance, and a LOT of drama! Even better is that the upperclassmen in our school are performing this play! The cast list features Toby Chernesky as Tito, Matt Woodward as Max, Molly Magee as Bernadette, Jessica Schuchardt as Maggie, Amelia Aversano as Maria, Emily Osborne as Diana, Kendal Plumstead as Julia, and Nick Cocco as The Bellhop! With this stellar cast, you won’t want to miss the three opportunities available to see the show! The first is this Friday, November 19th at 7 P.M., Saturday the 20th at 2 P.M. and 7 P.M. Tickets are $8 and available virtually only, so don’t miss your chance! Not only is it impressive how talented this cast is, but how wonderfully executed the play is, even with a raging pandemic lurking around. Lend Me A Tenor is the first Hunterdon Central Regional High School play to be performed live while in a pandemic, and most likely won’t be the last. Not only is it extremely difficult and stressful to perform in a play, but they’ve also now added masked rehearsals, constant contact tracing, and limited time slots to be allowed to sing, due to SARS-CoV-2s ability to travel by air. Also, most of the cast have other stressors, like college-level classes, after-school clubs, and athletics. Considering all of these things, it’s truly astonishing that this play was put together so well, with a huge part of that going to the directors and stage crew. 

Something cool about HCRHS productions is that there are student directors! The student directors for Lend Me A Tenor are Jenna Castellano, Marlon Veliz, and Arianna Bellotti. If it’s difficult to act in a play during a pandemic, it’s a billion times more difficult to direct a play in a pandemic. Not to mention that these directors are indeed students, meaning they all have other time-consuming tasks in their lives, like the actors and actresses. 

The glorious production of Lend Me a Tenor also belongs to the stage crew, with the stage manager being Charlotte Griffith who besides manning the lights, sounds, and sets, also helps the rest of the stage crew. It’s no secret that these guys are seriously talented and have been working day and night to show off their skills! Lend Me A Tenor is an amazing show, only being enhanced by the talented people we have in our school, it’s really impressive what they can execute in such a short amount of time whilst being in the middle of a pandemic. It’s truly a work of art, and the cast cannot wait to share what they’ve been so diligently working on!