“Was this musical inspired by Brian Cowen and Brian Lenihan?” I hear you ask! Definitely not! In fact, I want to assure you that this show has nothing to do with either man, or the budget. On the contrary, it’s a happy, bubbly, lively show, designed to blow away your budget blues.
It runs from Wednesday 10th to Saturday 13th December at 8pm each night in Marian College, Lansdowne Rd.
‘Back to the 80s’ marks the 33rd anniversary of the first Marian College musical, ‘Oliver’, and any of you who have seen the Marian College shows down through the years will know that you’re in for a treat.
We can’t claim to be able to emulate the standards of last year’s ‘Les Miserables’ (which was undoubtedly the best show ever seen on the Marian College stage), but we’ll give it a good shot.
The show is set in an American High School (no, it’s not ‘High School Musical 4’) and features Corey Palmer Snr., 30-something, looking back on his High-School graduation, and the events leading up to it, back in the 80s.
It has the usual mix of school high spirits, the inevitable love/ crush ingredients and misunderstandings, and of course the ‘baddies’, who want to spoil everyone else’s fun.
Chief among the latter is Michael Feldman, played by Matthew Ennis, while his rival, Corey Jnr., is played by his twin brother, Owen. Talk about brotherly love! Matthew and Owen are only in 5th year, yet incredibly, this is their fourth show with us, and last year we saw fantastic performances from both in ‘Les Mis’, Owen as Thenardier, and Matthew as Javert.
The twins live in Ringsend, but are well-known far beyond the confines of Dublin 4, having featured in many talent competitions and on TV.
What distinguishes this musical from other High school musicals is the music– there are no fewer than 21 hit songs of the 80s cleverly incorporated into the show, so it will be singalong time for all you people who were young in the 80s!
Sandymount man, Peter O’Donoghue, is our stage manager yet again. Peter has been with us for more years than he cares to remember, and is assisted by Kevin Kelly, stage designer supreme, well known to audiences since his days with Sandymount Musical Society when he and Peter started working together.
Bernard Lynch and Grainne McCarthy again direct. We welcome for the first time Sinead Leonard as choreographer, and yours truly is again banished to the pit as MD, assisted by new music teacher, Lorraine Lee, well known to followers of the Avonmore M.S. in Arklow.
The female principals and chorus are almost all drawn from Muckross Park, chief among them being last year’s Cosette, Sophie Moran, pictured above, who plays the sweet Tiffany, Shauna Carrick (last year’s Mme.Thenardier) as Miss Brannigan, the teacher with the ‘dark’ past, Sorcha Ni Dhuill (multi-parts last year) as Eileen, the new girl, and newcomer Sarah Gordon as Cyndi, who has dated every guy in the class.
The only non-Muckross girl is Cassandra Foley (niece of James, our maintenance man) from Pobailscoil Neasain, Bayside, who plays Debbie.
We hope that all you past-pupils of Marian College, St.Mary’s Haddington Rd, and Muckross Park (and your families) will come along to enjoy the show. Others, of course, are also more than welcome, even Brian Cowen and Brian Lenihan!
For bookings please phone Anne during school hours at 6684036, or myself at 087-9195012, or you can email rayryan66@yahoo.com