BWW Blog: Rebecca Salzhauer and Yanni Frank - Everything's Coming Up... Farmboys? 

What do small children, stage mothers, cows, egg rolls and strippers have in common? Gypsy, of course, Riverdale Rising Stars' multi-generational show this season!

As you can probably guess from the name "multi-generational show" this show one of an annual production featuring performers from elementary school to people in their seventies! It's a very unique experience for us because, as high schoolers, we aren't used to being in shows where kids play kids, teens play teens, and adults play adults! Rebecca is used to being the crazy overbearing mother, but here both of us play farm boys in Dainty June's vaudeville act! Well, Rebecca has to do some acting because of the gender thing, but it's a lot of fun!

SO, I (Yanniv) did not audition for this show. When Laurie (our director) told us she needed boys I immediately volunteered! The first rehearsal was definitely...something. It was definitely not something I was used to--doing a show with adult actors. They definitely pushed me (literally and metaphorically) to take rehearsals more seriously.

There are adults in the show and working on the show who I knew before like Jordan (the show's director), Ronnie (#bumpitwithatrumpet), and Judah (the act is booked-need I say more), but there were also a bunch of brand new faces! During this show I got to have "a real good time" with Erica (June), Juliet (Choreography), Sean (Tulsa), and Jen (The Moo Cow formerly known as Louise). These guys are so talented! Erica is hilarious, Juliet let me steal a star moment from Erica, Jen is the best Moo Cow I've ever seen, and Shawn just breaks out into spontaneous time steps!

I also was given the job of drawing the fish for Sahm (Angie or LA or Yonkers...Not sure) to give to Louise, making the plaque for 50 years of railroad service, and constructing a camera out of a cardboard box (which I later found in the trash ;) I really like being a part of the behind the scenes process. I even got to label all of the foods in "Mr. Goldstone!"

I (Rebecca) was initially not in the show. How, you ask, did I get roped in like Caroline the moo-cow on the farm? [EW WHAT WAS THAT JOKE] Well, since Yanniv and another farm-boy, Elijah were missing the same performance and our director Laurie was stressing out about what to do, I volunteered to cover the show they were missing and the rest is history!

I came into my first rehearsal (which just so happened to be the second day of tech...oops!) having learned the dances from a video Yanniv texted to me last Sunday. Anyway as a rehearsal cane for the Broadway number I used a series of items including an umbrella, a mop, and a toilet scrubber (#whatididforlove).

When I came into rehearsal for the first time, everyone was so welcoming! I knew some of the kids, like Yanniv's little brother and some of his friends and a few adults, like Marilyn (nobody else rocks light up lingerie like her as Electra) and of course all of the other teens.

They all knew that I was going to be entering the cast because my friends had been giving them updates and saying that I learned all of the dances in two days. Short term memory, it's a wonderful thing. When they saw me they would come up to me and say, "Oh, are you the new farm-boy?" Also when I was getting into costume I got to know the incredible and legendary Betsy (ROSE!) who is not only so talented and honestly kind of scary as Rose but is so kind! Rose is a dream role of mine, so I love getting to watch her!

Performing with our whole little vaudeville group has been an interesting and very cool experience because, although all of the farm-boys are played by performers from the teen program (like us) who know each other maybe a little bit too well, we get to work with adult actors like the people playing Sean and Erica and learn from them in the process of rehearsing. They definitely keep us on track when we goof off and we are very thankful that they are there.

It's also really fun to be with all of the little kids who play newsboys and are in our junior program (Michaela if you are reading this we love you!). Once our bit in Act 1 is over, we get to sit in the house together and watch Act 2 and sometimes get some very interesting questions or commentary about the strippers in the show from the little kids.

We can't wait to perform with this crazy cast and then get back to Zombie Prom :)

P.S. If you want to come see Gypsy at the Riverdale Y, visit riverdaley.org/gypsy (we promise it will be fun!)