playbill vip

It's a funny thing how a show comes together.

When I received the call from Mr. Benson in April of this year inviting me to join the Rider family, I immediately set to work selecting a fall mainstage. Theatre teachers everywhere consider the same things when picking a show – cast size, nearby productions, talent available – but I found myself with a particular challenge: How would I know the best fit for our students without having ever met them? Would they be expecting a popular show? A classic? Should it have a large cast, or would this troupe be smaller?

I eventually selected The Brothers Grimm Spectaculathon because it seemed to check as many boxes on my invisible, shape-shifting checklist as possible. The staging is fairly simple, the stories are familiar to all of us, and the casting is flexible – from as few as four to as many as thirty-seven. Imagine my surprise when over forty students turned out to audition!

This production continued in much the same way, with both challenging and happy surprises all the way to today. Throughout, our cast and crew have risen to the occasion and grown tremendously as performers, as people, and as a family. It has been such a pleasure to work with and get to know these young people, as well as to forge so many relationships with the kind, thoughtful, and hard-working staff here at Roosevelt. There is truly nowhere I would rather have begun my directoral career, and I am so deeply grateful to every person who has made this performance possible. From the bottom of my heart: Enjoy the show.

Jacob Aychman