Interview: It's a Party!: Cory Jeacoma Debuts in MAMMA MIA!

It's a party -under the blue skies and Mediterranean sun of a Greek island - or at least an evocation of that paradise on the stage of Maine State Music Theatre in Brunswick. "It's a party and a great story, and I am so very excited to be part of it! I look forward to revisiting the ABBA music and to encouraging the audience to get up and dance and sing with us."

Cory Jeacoma is talking about the anticipation swirling around this week's opening of MSMT fourth main stage production, Mamma Mia!, in which he makes his MSMT debut in the leading role of Sky. The vibrant young actor, who just four months ago was graduated from Pace University's musical theatre program, has been working steadily for some years now and is already on his way to making his name and talents known.

In tracing his path to Brunswick this summer, Jeacoma recounts how he came to audition for Mamma Mia! this past April. "I had done Legally Blonde at the Fulton Theatre this past winter for director/choreographer Marc Robin, and Curt Dale Clark [MSMT's Artistic Director] was in the cast as well. When I went into the audition for Curt, there was an ease in the room that you don't often feel, and I think that helped me to perform at my best."

That ease is a quality that the actor feels important to bring to his character, Sky, Sophie's fiancé. "Sky and I have a great deal in common. He is a simple guy who is on this island to escape from the world of stocks and bonds where he was working. When I make my entrance, I have longish hair and am wearing a long flowing tank top that says just that. At one point I say to Sophie that I would rather take a boat to the mainland and get married with a few witnesses than have this big white wedding. So, at the end, when Sophie decides to call off the wedding and just join me on a trip around the world, the two share this beautiful realization. She understands that she doesn't need a fancy wedding; she loves Sky and wants to be with him forever and to make him happy, and she knows going off together is what he would want. Really, it is a story about finding who you truly are as a person, of connecting with yourself. Sophie and Sky have a dialogue where she says she wants to get married knowing who she is. And Sky responds that that doesn't come from knowing who your dad is; it comes from within you."

Like everyone else in the cast of this iconic show, Jeacoma is in awe of the ABBA score. Though ABBA's heyday was well before Jeacoma's time, he affirms how contemporary the songs remain. "There is something about them that you can't help tapping your toes. Actually, that's the bane of everyone's existence rehearsing this piece. And I promise you that after the show every single person [in the audience] is going to be dancing to it and singing it for the next week. The music is contagious; it just sits in your body, and you can fight it all you want to, but sooner or later, you will find yourself giving in." Jeacoma also explains that in licensing the rights to the show, the producers agree to perform the ABBA score exactly as it was written with all the backup vocals, every trill, every note as in the original, and so the sound will be unreal!" He commends Music Director Sam Bagala for his meticulous attention to all these musical details.

This is also Jeacoma's first time working with director/choreographer Mark Martino, whom he praises for the spirit and amazing dance numbers he has created. "The rehearsal process here is very quick, but Mark and everyone at MSMT is great about finessing the schedule so it works in a stellar way. I love the fact that, like my experience at the Fulton where Marc Robin shoots you out of a canon, so to speak, everyone here at MSMT comes in totally prepared and ready to work very hard to make the best product they can. It's refreshing and energizing!"

Jeacoma credits his own preparation as a performer to his training at Florida's StarStruck Academy and his education at Pace University. As a child in West Palm Beach, Florida, he performed in talent shows and auditioned for the school musicals, but it wasn't until his junior year of high school when some of his friends were auditioning for college theatre programs that Jeacoma realized he, too, could make this a profession. He enrolled in Jennifer and Peter Jones' StarStruck Academy and began to seriously study singing, dancing, and acting, and to perform in quite a few major musical roles. "Jennifer and Peter Jones, who run Starstruck, are like second parents to me. They were the first to see something in me and to take the time to convince me that theatre could be more than a hobby. I pretty much started studying singing and dancing there. They encouraged me to go to college in a musical theatre program, and they helped me put together my entire audition portfolio - what songs to sing, what monologues to do. They remain very special to me because they gave me the solid foundation I needed to go off to college and to the real world."

Jeacoma was accepted to Pace University's selective B.F.A. program in musical theatre, and he praises Amy Rogers who heads the program for all her guidance and support. "Going to New York City was an education in itself," he recalls. It was daunting at first, but it is five years now that I call NYC home, and I still am in awe of the place. I walk around sometimes and stare up at the skyscrapers and say to myself, 'I LIVE here. Some people try their whole lives, but I am actually here.'"

One of the things that Jeacoma liked about Pace's program was that the college permitted its theatre students to work professional jobs while in school. While still a student, Jeacoma took part in two major workshops of new musicals, Pasek and Paul's The Invisible Man and Adam Guettel's Dogfight. Jeacoma savors these workshop opportunities because " they allow you the chance to build a character from the ground up rather than performing a revival role, and there aren't always many occasions to do that except on Broadway or at regional houses like the Goodspeed which do premieres. Working with Pasek and Paul Or with Adam Guettel, who were there throughout the rehearsals, is a thrilling experience. " Jeacoma says even the challenge of having constantly to learn new music or scenes in the development process was exciting. Of Dogfight, he adds, "To have a lead in a show like that - Eddie Birdlace - and to get to do all the research for my character [who is a Vietnam veteran] was really cool. I gained a respect for the time period and for so many things I never knew before."

Another show which appears on Jeacoma's recent resume is Legally Blonde, in which he playEd Warner Huntington III at the Fulton Theatre in January-February 2016. Jeacoma relishes the fact that he had first learned the show in Florida, playing Emmett, "the nice guy," at Starstruck, and it "was fun to come back to it and play 'a bit of the bad guy.' Warner is charming, but he is an idiot," Jeacoma says. But it was fun to wear all his nice suits and sing a big number, and, of course, working with Marc Robin was a thrill. Warner isn't really evil, though - just a real schmuck. I also played Chuck Cranston in Footloose at the Fulton this summer, and he is mean and violent. So, it is lovely to get to play Sky now because he is a really nice guy."

Clearly, Jeacoma is savoring the rush of experiences his still young career has brought, but he also looks forward with a prudent eye to all that lies before him. Asked if now that he has embarked on his vocation professionally, what long and short term goals he may hold, Jeacoma replies, citing Andy Karl and Richard H. Blake as examples: "I think I'd like to build a career where I originate first small roles and then grow into playing title roles. I have a great respect for artists who are known as serious actors, as well as song and dance men."

Yet, just as he has aspirations for the future, Cory Jeacoma is very much aware that an actor's métier must exist fully in the present for it to be successful. "I learned that at Pace - to be focused on the present moment - and with all today's devices and distractions, that is not always easy. I try to remember that this is what I am doing NOW and to embrace that and the people I am working with - to soak in every second of the experience. One of the things about theatre is that in a very short time, you build a family and camaraderie, and those friendships remain with you always. It is the intensity of the whole process that I love."

Photos courtesy of MSMT, Mamma Mia photo Roger S. Duncan, photographer

Mamma Mia runs at MSMT's Pickard Theater from August 10-August 27, 2016. www.msmt.org 207-725-8769

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