Carmel Community Players (CCP) will stage Lend Me A Tenor at The Cat, 254 Veterans Way, Carmel, for two weekends starting Feb. 28. The show will begin at 7:30 p.m.
The play is set in September 1934. Saunders, the general manager of the Cleveland Grand Opera Company, is primed to welcome the greatest tenor of his generation, Il Stupendo, to appear for one night only as the star of the opera. Mistaken identities and a false diagnosis of death make for a great sensation on Broadway and in London’s West End. This madcap, screwball comedy is guaranteed to leave audiences teary-eyed with laughter.
Director Susan Rardin has been involved in theater since she was seven years old.
“I started in the high school productions in our school system. I played one of the younger children in Cheaper By the Dozen, but the first role I ever had was a high school production of A Christmas Carol,” Rardin said. “I was the urchin at the very end of the show. Scrooge asked me to go get the goose and my line was, ‘The one as big as me?’ The was the beginning of when I was addicted to theater.”
Having now done “a little of everything except running lights and sound,” Rardin, who also directed the historical drama Failure to Zig Zag is at the helm for this musical comedy.
Because Lend Me A Tenor is making fun of the world of opera, Rardin has some help on this production from inside the industry.
Tom Smith (left) plays Saunders and Tyler Marx plays Max in the Carmel Community Players production of Lend Me a Tenor. (Photo provided)
Rachelle Woolston, who plays the role of Diana, is not only acting this this play, but she is serving as CCP’s opera consultant.
“I have been involved theater since middle school,” Woolston told The Reporter. “In opera, I have a doctorate in voice from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. I did grad school and then I did a lot of opera in California where we used to live in Los Angeles. Here in Indianapolis I have been working at the Indianapolis Opera where I have been working as their education director for the last three years.”
Ironically, Woolston’s character does not sing in this production.
“I love the fact that Indianapolis has thriving community theaters and that they all help each other,” Woolston said. “This show is really fun for people who know opera and for people who do not. Don’t think you have to know about opera – if you know zero about it this show is still hilarious.”
It is the hilarity that drew in John Walls, who plays Tito Morelli.
“This show is a real crowd pleaser,” Walls said. “I have never seen a live stage play that I laugh at more than when I first saw this show.”
His character, Tito, is at the time the world’s most renowned tenor.
“It is one of my favorite plays,” Walls said. “I saw it several years ago. I always thought if I saw Lend Me A Tenor come up again I would give it a shot. When I auditioned for Saunders, the manager of the opera, I had a feeling because of my singing background that Susan [Rardin] might want me to read for Tito.”
This is my his first CCP production.
“I have not worked with anyone in this production before, which is pretty unusual,” Walls said. “You usually run into someone. This cast has been very professional, very easy. There are no egos to step on. It is a very cooperative cast and I have had a blast!”
Tyler Marx, who plays Max, has 15 years of theatrical experience.
“This is my second show with CCP,” Marx said. “I did the Failure to Zig Zag with them over the summer, which Susan also directed. I liked working with her and with CCP so when this popped up, I thought it looked like fun. I prefer mixing up comedy and drama. I like switching between the two as palate cleansers. I like doing straight plays, musicals, dramas and comedies. This is one of the most challenging comedies I’ve been in just because of the specific timing that is involved and all the minute details involved with everything.”
Sonja Distefano, who plays Maria, finds comedy to be much easier than many actors seem to.
“I like the pace,” Distefano said. “If it is a well-written comedy the pace is built in. Especially in a show like Lend Me A Tenor, the writing is so precise and brilliant and so fast-paced that you just can’t help but get it right and nail the comedy.”
In her role for this play, she draws on her husband’s Italian grandmother as inspiration.
“She didn’t take a lot of attitude from anybody,” Distefano said. “When she was in her 90s, she beat up a mugger in downtown Detroit. Somebody was trying to steal her purse and she went after him with her cane! I wear her wedding ring, which I am also wearing as Maria’s wedding ring for the show. It is from the 1920s.”
She called CCP’s cast and crew brilliant.
“They are some of the funniest people I have every worked with and everybody has been fabulous,” Distefano said.