Music City Theatre Collective Launches With SHOWSTOPPERS

Music City Theatre Collective - the brainchild of Nashville artists Curtis Reed, Jenny Norris-Light, Chase Miller and Martha Wilkinson, among others - will launch its highly anticipated and rather unique company this weekend with a series of performances designed to highlight the Collective's upcoming endeavors.

Showstoppers, which will feature performances of aspiring young actors alongside some of the region's best-known professionals, is set for January 29-13 at St. Philip's Episcopal Church's Dimmick Hall, 85 Fairway Drive.

"It's a cavalcade of great musical theatre numbers performed by outstanding Nashville theatre faves as well as new faces to our theatre community you'll be glad you got to see first," Wilkinson explains.

In addition to the planned musical performances, MCTC will unveil plans for its upcoming partnership with Metro Parks Arts Program to present "a fully realized production of Oklahoma! in the Centennial Park Bandshell this coming June (before Nashville Shakespeare Festival moves into that space). Children and adults from the Metro Parks Continuing Education Programs in dance, music, and theatre will complement professional actors and crew from the Nashville area. The resulting production will showcase The Collective's philosophy of a community-based theatrical collaboration."

The Music City Theatre Collective is described as an "open-door" theatre company that strives to provide a safe, nurturing environment for the seasoned performer, the recreational performer, and the student seeking training and artistic expansion.

"We would like the Collective to be another professional theatre company that provides steady work to local professional actors, and a place for students fresh out of Belmont, Vanderbilt and Lipscomb to continue to learn, gain some professional credits on their resumes, be able to work and teach alongside some of Nashville's most notable local artists and create imaginative live theater that is affordable to the masses, which will be done through our partnership with Metro Parks and the Bandshell space in Centennial Park," Reed says.

"Eventually, we would like to establish Nashville's first Summer Stock theater company, where local actors will have steady work during the summer months and the bandshell can be utilized a lot more," Reed suggests. "We will start our venture towards summer stock with this year's production of Oklahoma! which will take place mid-June in the bandshell."

"With Oklahoma! on the horizon, fundraising efforts have begun, and our recent Christmas event, Home for the Holidays, was the first step in that process and SHOWSTOPPERS is our next step," says Miller, the company's managing director.

"We have created something unique with Showstoppers," Reed maintains, "in which local teens who are invested in learning about a career in theater have worked tirelessly in a five-day intensive workshop and then have combined forces with our professional cast during the rehearsal process to bring you a very high-energy, talent-packed review of some of our favorite musical numbers."

Professional cast members of Showstoppers includes Jennifer Whitcomb Oliva, Chase Miller, Caressa Alan, Audrey Johnson, Mallory Mundy, Melissa Silengo, Martha Wilkinson, Iordanis Ekimogloy, Taylor Kelly, James Rudolph, Tosha Pendergrast, Brooke Leigh Davis and Curtis Reed.

"What I am most looking forward to on our journey of growth with MCTC is a spirit of collaboration, inclusion and continual learning, as well as a celebration of traditional musical theater which, of course, is my heart," Norris-Light adds.

Norris-Light's daughter Katherine is one of the younger performers taking part in Showstoppers and watching the process via her daughter has helped to illuminate the company's mission for her, she contends.

"It actually has been better for Katherine, I think, for me not to be performing in the show," Norris-Light muses. "I think sometimes she has felt overshadowed in her own aspirations because of me doing this for my career, so being able to be there to support her along the way has been good."

"And she's getting to be one of the Annies, which she has wanted to do since she did Annie at Chaffin's Barn with me six years ago, so it's a dream come true for her. Since I haven't been involved in the process, Katherine knows she got it on her own merits."

From her unique perspective, Norris-Light explains, "I'm witnessing the results of our ideas of education and inclusion working through my daughter and her feeling inspired and growing because of it. That is invaluable to me. It's empowering the kids! They feel that they are given opportunities that usually they don't receive. And it makes them want to train more, to learn more, to be better."

"What makes this workshop and show different from other theater companies is the fact that it truly showcases each child in song and dance right alongside professional actors," Reed says. "They are doing some of the same dances that the professionals are doing, they are singing duets or group numbers with other professionals, they are getting to see how a professional show is run and the responsibilities of adult actors and how we work together as a team."

Tickets for Showstoppers are available for purchase at www.musiccitytheatrecollective.com or by phone at (615) 918-0647. Tickets for the Friday Night Gala are $50 per person, with curtain at 6:30 p.m. Friday night's opening includes wine and beer, appetizers, table seating and silent auction. General admission tickets for performances on January 30 (2:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.) and Sunday, January 31 (2:30 p.m.) are $25 per person. Table seating for four people is available for $100, which includes four complimentary drink tickets and appetizers for the table.

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