McMaster’s musical theatre community is opening the (virtual) curtains on its 2021 season

Following a musical theatre season that was cut short in 2020, McMaster University’s musical theatre community is back and looking forward to a 2021 season full of song, dance and fun-filled departmental productions.

“[Last year], our opening night was our last. It was the eve of school getting cancelled, so we got one show. Afterwards, having to see our cast’s heartbreak at the show being cancelled and seeing how sweet and supportive everyone was was really hard. The whole joy of theatre is getting to be in the space with people and building those relationships . . . it makes me feel good to think that we’re keeping things going, even if it’s not ideal,” said Gillian Maltz, a third-year arts and sciences student and the script supervisor for the ArtSci Musical.

The majority of faculty musicals have adopted an asynchronous viewing platform for their musicals, where the final show essentially is a Zoom window. The dialogue will be simulated by editing the cast’s individual videos together. The timing of dialogue became an issue online because, when recording from home, cast members don’t have each others’ cues to bounce off of for timing.

“[I]f you want to talk to somebody you pretend they’re on your right or your left. It’s the funniest thing ever when you’re filming and basically telling everyone “hey, can you look in that direction when you say something to them?” It’s obviously not something that we would tell them in person, but now [the cast] has to imagine that there are these people around them and they’re just in their bedrooms,” explained Khoi Hoang, a fourth-year chemical biology student and director of the MacSci Musical.

To rectify the problem, the Health Sciences Musical and McMaster Musical Theatre found a solution where they record dialogue while in a Zoom meeting with the cast. They would listen for each others’ cues through headphones, while simultaneously recording themselves on a separate device.

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Music production is also a challenge in an online environment, given that cast and band members’ home audio quality is largely variable. In a band, musicians also face the issue of no longer having each others’ cues to work from.

“Speaking from a band perspective, usually you hear everyone playing together and hearing what other people are playing gives me a cue for where to come in . . . On Zoom, what we do is we split off into different sections based on our instruments, and then we'll record,” said Wendy Yu, a third-year health sciences student currently playing trombone in the Health Sciences musical band, as well as assisting their executive of promotions and events.

Another challenge that the departmental musicals are facing is learning and teaching choreography online. 

“[I]t’s a lot harder to learn [choreography] over Zoom, especially because a lot of us sometimes struggle with internet connection as well. I’m one of those people, so learning these dances that are sometimes really intensive, while making sure you have enough space in your room and all this making sure the cast is in sync when we record it, has been an ongoing struggle,” said Zach Thorne, a fourth-year computer engineering and society student and assistant director for the Engineering musical.

Between the difficulties of learning choreography through the screen, constraints with space, internet connectivity issues and timing issues, choreographers have had to adapt to the barriers to teaching dance online. 

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“For me, the biggest challenge was definitely following and learning the choreography and all the dances. [Our choreographers] did literally the best job choreographers could do online, by providing us with a guide video for basically every song,” said Felix Hu, a first-year health sciences student and cast member in the Health Sciences musical. 

Given that musicals will no longer be showing in person, crew and backstage contributors have had to take a backseat this year. Where lighting, props and set design once played an essential role in musical production, McMaster musicals have had to become creative in their approach to incorporating the crew.

“We were concerned about how to incorporate crew because normally crew works all semester to make a ton of cool props . . . We have some physical props, which I actually drove all around Hamilton and the GTA to pick up and drop off at cast members’ homes. Then, we're also taking advantage of Zoom and making digital backgrounds so that people can have digital backgrounds on Zoom,” explained Maeve Johnston, director of the Engineering musical.

A brand new component of creating online musical productions is video and sound editing. The student-produced musicals have had to navigate the technical barriers of camera setups, different recording environments and video and sound quality.

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The online sphere has also provided the opportunity for musical theatre to not only adapt to producing a musical online but also to reinvent what it means to put on a show. McMaster Musical Theatre and the ArtSci Musical took brand new approaches to musical theatre production.

This year’s McMaster Musical Theatre showcase entitled Reimagining Musical Theatre aims to address the musical theatre industry’s history of excluding Black, Indigenous and People of Colour, 2LGBTQIA+ and disabled voices. 

“The idea was to really interrogate and question the ways in which specific marginalized communities have been left out of Broadway musicals and theatre spaces. Find a way to look at musicals we know and love and question: can we reshape this to be more inclusive for different audiences who have not been able to access the stage in the same way as cisgender white people who are currently on Broadway?” explained Khaleel Gandhi, the McMaster Musical Theatre president and fourth-year theatre, film and multimedia studies student.

The showcase will consist of a number of classical Broadway songs, reimagined through McMaster Musical Theatre’s lens. For example, one of the showcase pieces will be presented entirely in sign language. 

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The ArtSci Musical took a completely different approach, instead deciding to focus on creating a radio drama series and a fringe show. The radio series, entitled Storytime, is currently on Spotify and Apple Music. ArtSci students submitted stories and concepts that are told by a narrator and a few student voice actors.

The fringe show, which has the theme An Artistic Exploration of the Meaning of Home, will be a collection of scenes, dance, music, song and poetry connected through narration. The show is student-produced with an original script and entirely original music.

“I think the goal is partly to produce something that is somewhat similar to a musical, but it's more so to keep the spirit of the musical alive and also to foster some kind of environment similar to a theatrical environment for the community,” said Chloe Sloane, a second-year arts & sciences student and co-director of the ArtSci Musical.

With the disconnect that students so often feel when distanced due to online learning, Mac’s musical theatre families have found connection and community in their shared love of the performing arts. Current first-year students have gotten a chance to get involved from last summer, providing an avenue to meet others and engage with the post-secondary community.

“The sense of community is really valuable . . . I really do appreciate everything people give not only in terms of the creativity and the participation but also just being themselves and the fun stories that came out as a result,” said Sean Lyeo, a fourth-year health sciences student and script supervisor for the Health Sciences Musical.

Currently, the MacSci Musical is available for streaming online for $14, where all profits are in support of the Aboriginal Health Centre. The Health Sciences Musical hopes to release their productions in late spring, while the Engineering Musical plans to release their musical as an episodic series in September. The McMaster Musical and ArtSci Musical teams are still planning when to release their final products.

Reflecting on changes to family relationships during the pandemic

Homebound for now over a year, this has been a time of waiting. Waiting for school days back on campus. Waiting for a vaccine. Waiting for lockdown measures to be lifted to see friends and family again. But despite feeling stuck in one place, there has been much change both in the world around us and in ourselves. 

One of the many changes I experienced this past year has been my relationship with my family, particularly my aunt. Standing at just under five feet tall, my aunt is the shortest but also the toughest woman I know. 

She immigrated to Canada by herself from South Korea when she was just 21 years old and was forced to carve her own path in the world. She went from being a convenience store cashier, to opening her own video rental business, then to working as a nail technician at a salon. 

I moved to Canada at the age of eight with my mom and younger sister. My aunt taught my sister and I to not rely on our mom, but to do our chores without being told and to clean up after ourselves.

I still remember one incident when I was still in elementary school and my sister and I forgot to bring our food containers to the sink after school, one of my aunt’s biggest pet peeves. We woke up the following morning to find no lunches on the counter. Instead, we had to make do with our own emergency five-minute bagels with cream cheese for lunch. 

My aunt was extremely strict with us but even stricter with herself. Growing up in her hands with my mom always busy at work as a single parent, I adapted her independent mindset. It has been a fundamental part of who I am for as long as I could remember.

There is not a single memory I can recall of seeing my aunt crying. She always bottled up her pain, hardships and struggles and never revealed when she was having a tough time. Everyone thought she was built like an unbreakable soldier.

On Christmas Eve of 2016, my aunt was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer with metastasis. It was a shock to everyone who knew her well. I didn’t understand how a person as fierce and resilient as my aunt could come down with such a vicious disease. 

I only later learned that my aunt had suspected something was wrong with her body for some time, but she was too scared to admit it. By the time we figured it out, her x-ray lit up like a Christmas tree. The cancer had metastasized everywhere and all too much to undergo surgery. 

When I saw her for the first time quietly laying in her hospital bed and heard her heavy, stertorous breathing, she suddenly didn’t seem all that mighty. That Christmas, for the first time, I saw how frail she was, how vulnerable she was, how afraid she was.

For the first time, our family opened up to our deepest, rawest feelings and emotions. For the first time, all of us were willing to admit that we were scared. 

Fast forward five years to today, my aunt is currently receiving palliative care, but to me, she is still the same strong, mighty warrior I saw her as when I was a child. Although I miss many things from before the pandemic, I’m appreciative of the extra time I got to spend with my aunt and family at home. 

I was able to be there for my mom every time she had to take my aunt to the hospital. I also learned more about my aunt — her favourite foods, what she was like when she was my age and friends and people she’s met. 

I used to resent her for not telling us about her pain, which would’ve helped to get her diagnosis earlier, but I realized that as a female Asian immigrant, her stubbornness and resilience were characteristics necessary for her to survive. Most importantly, I got to reflect on old memories and create new, truly special memories together with the precious time we have left. 

We sometimes feel the need to conceal our emotions from our loved ones out of fear of looking weak or to avoid making them worry. However, these days, my family is unafraid to forfeit our emotional barriers and simply be soft, vulnerable people. Especially during times of hardship, grief and uncertainty, there is nothing more powerful than family to give us hope, support and comfort.

Photo C/O Darya Kraplak

I originally applied for Editor-in-Chief in February 2020, before most of us were really aware of the looming international news ahead (at least in hindsight it feels that way).

As I went through the application and interview process, things changed rapidly across the world. Met with seemingly unprecedented and unexpected circumstances, we all adjusted in our own way to the “new world”.

My first experience of this “new world” was conducting my interview over a Skype call that lasted five minutes before the unreliable service became absolutely unusable. So we switched to an old school conference call over the phone. At the time, I optimistically (read: naively) thought that would be the last interview or meeting I would have to conduct over the phone or internet.

Fast forward to now, and I have spent an entire job — from my onboarding to transitioning the new team — online.

I only worked in the Silhouette office — one of my favourite spaces — a handful of times over the past 12 months. I have still never met the majority of the Sil staff that I hired in person.

Those are only two things on a long long list of ways I had envisioned spending my final year working for the Silhouette, also my final year at a school I called home for six years (I really missed Burridge Gym this year).

With that all being said, I will always look back fondly on this year. I believe our team worked really hard to cover as many events as possible and share the various stories of the wide variety of people that make up the McMaster and Hamilton community. I believe we delivered on our goals and promises.

In the most trying year, we tried our best and made the most of it. If we learned anything this past year, it’s that together we can make the best of the worst situations. So, here’s to last year’s words, as next year’s words await another voice.

In the spirit of optimism — thumbs up only for this week.

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