As spring quickly approaches, SAHS students involved in spring musical are rapidly trying to prepare for their upcoming performances. In a typical year, musical rehearsals would have started in January, but due to COVID-19, rehearsals only started last week.

New director Mr. Anthony Martello is doing his best to keep the performing arts sane during this time of craziness. After having auditions and call-backs, not getting the rights to the original show proposed, having to do another round of call- backs, securing the rights to another show, and then having to postpone every rehearsal due to COVID-19, Martello has gone through quite a bit of insanity.

“We requested the rights to ‘The Drowsy Chaperone’, and even announced that as our show. Unfortunately, getting show rights is a tricky situation.  You cannot be within a certain number of miles from a professional theater and within a certain amount of time where that theater plans to put on a given show.  That’s what happened to us, so we had to move on,” he said about the issue of not being granted rights to their first choice for a show.

When picking a show this year, Martello had an extremely difficult time. Between losing nearly half of the musical budget from last year’s lost performances and factoring in the cost of the rights of the show, the choices are very limited.

Blind auditions, auditioning for a show without actually knowing what the show is, were held before the issues with the rights to “The Drowsy Chaperone”. After the audition process, the tentative show was announced. Martello forewarned everyone that the rights were not 100 percent secured, but he let them know that there could not be any more rehearsal time lost.

He started the callback process right before being notified of losing the rights to the show. After that major setback, Martello kept searching for the perfect show and finally decided on “The Wedding Singer”.

“We are so excited about ‘The Wedding Singer’! We feel like it highlights the very talented students we have here.  Honestly, the biggest problem we faced while picking a show was the abundance of talent, we really wanted to showcase as many students as possible. It’s a good problem to have,” he said.

Shortly after Martello made the announcement, the high school was temporarily shut down due to COVID-19. He had to revamp the whole rehearsal schedule that he spent an enormous amount of time creating.

Rehearsals had to be pushed back further than they were intended to be which means that over the next few weeks, everyone involved in the spring musical will be rehearsing more than ever.

Throughout all of the craziness Martello has been put up against, he still makes rehearsals fun and uplifting. He makes sure that everything is getting done, but he still makes time for rehearsals to be fun.

Everyone involved in the spring musical has been incredibly grateful for his leadership and positive attitude that he takes in tackling the obstacles.

“Mr. Martello’s energy makes the musical so enjoyable because it is a fun escape from everyday life. Mr. Martello’s dedication to make the musical a really enjoyable experience is truly what makes the show so special to me,” sophomore Lauren Lorenz said.