The Sault Opera Legacy

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1981

The Three Musketeers: Athos (Randy Smith), Porthos (Terry McPhee), and Aramis (Jacques Chouinard) along with the chorus

The year 1981 has been a very busy, productive, and profitable year for Sault Opera with three stage productions presented, of which the first one, "The Three Musketeers", had been already cast in November of 1980 with local leads and a professional director, Virginia Reh, whose services were made available through a grant from the Community Theatre Training Program of Theatre Ontario, funded by the Ontario Arts Council. The director's original, amusing, and clever concept of staging this operetta, coupled with a successful advertising campaign with a lot of special support from Huron Broadcasting Company, whose AM radio station CKCY made it a part of its "Love Week" campaign for Valentine's Day Week, made it a successful and well-attended production.

The cast of "The Student Prince"

The second show, a revival of "The Student Prince", was cast in March and produced in May at the Korah Collegiate Theatre. All the major leads could not be cast locally, mainly because there was nobody available at the time to take the parts of the lead soprano and tenor. Karen McLean, who came back to the Sault from London, Ontario for her summer holidays, took the part of the lead soprano and a professional tenor, Martin Spencer, was hired to take the part of the Prince. The show was directed and designed by Arno Ambel with assistance from Stephen Rutti, who conceived and executed the blocking of several scenes and all the choreographed moves of the chorus scenes. The show was well received by the audiences and got good reviews in the media; however, the attendance figures at the gate were poor and the show lost money.

The Farm Girls in "Oklahoma!"

For its third show of the year, "Oklahoma!", Sault Opera hired Joy Lowry for directing and choreographing the show. Casting began in the last week of August and the company succeeded in recruiting a well-balanced group of talented local performers for the lead parts as well as an enthusiastic and hard-working chorus. In turn, the show was a smash hit with enthusiastic reviews and record-breaking attendance and box office returns of over $10, 000 thanks to Joy Lowry's untiring efforts which made the final product a very well polished performance. The producer, Karen Pomber, enjoyed the full co-operation of all the production staff; the media advertising campaign was well-organized and the participation in the Wintario "Half-Back" Program helped the company to sell lots of tickets.

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