Every other year, the Central Wisconsin Educational Theatre Alliance (CWETA) gathers kids from across the Wausau area and surrounding counties to come together and put on a show with some guidance from a seasoned theater professional. The shows, often a delighting spectacle, are always well-recieved and well-attended, but what the charmed audiences don’t witness is the significant personal growth and deep collaboration that these students develop over weeks of rehearsal by overcoming challenges and cultivating confidence alongside one another.
Earlier this month, the director, cast and crew for the upcoming CWETA production of “Shrek the Musical,” which opens Feb. 5 at Wausau West High School, sat down with City Pages and peeled back the curtain to reveal the lessons, challenges and fun that go on backstage.
CWETA productions are put together every other year, as the nonprofit theater alliance gathers resources and fundraises during the “off years.” Once a venue is set, and a show is chosen, the casting call begins, drawing enthusiastic student-actors from all reaches.
“We have kids from all over central Wisconsin,” said Laurie Maegli, CWETA founder and artistic director. “[Wausau] East, [Wausau] West, Everest, Newman, Northland, Merill, Mosinee, Marathon, Birnamwood, Pittsville. We have a student from Marshfield, we have four cast members from Stevens Point. Any distance they are willing to commute is fine with us. They can be involved.”
One of the leads in the upcoming production, Cayley Gosney, is from Pittsville and travels over an hour one-way to be part of the production.
“CWETA gives you an opportunity to be in a show and to make friends with people that you wouldn’t typically get,” Gosney said.
Through her experience in prior CWETA shows, Gosney made friendships and life-changing theater connections in the Wausau area. This experience ultimately led to her transferring schools to attend Wausau West, where she had new friends and experience a richer theater program.
“Theater gave me the confidence to transfer high schools an hour away halfway through high school, finishing my junior and senior year an hour away from where I live,” she said. “I think theater has helped me be more confident in who I am. As long as you are being yourself, you will find people who love you.”
“These kids meet people they would never otherwise encounter,” Maegli said. “These students have a lot of opportunities to connect with other students and learn about working together and supporting each other. The teamwork involved in this show is no different than in athletics.”
CWETA shows cast many of their characters twice, essentially creating two shows. This allows more students from the area’s sizable talent pool to share the spotlight, but also gives older students (many of whom are cast as leads) more free time to complete university tours and interviews during the winter and spring months.
One of the reasons Maegli chose “Shrek the Musical” was because it features a large cast of distinct characters who all get a moment to shine.
“This really gives a lot of people a lot of opportunities to show their stuff and be the best performance they can be,” she said.
Three of the production’s principal actors — Gosney, Catherine Harmon and Kian Sullivan — all said “Shrek” offered them the opportunity to play roles that were traditionally outside their comfort zone.
“The character is not something I’ve ever really played before,” said Harmon, a D.C. Everest senior who plays the Dragon and the Witch. “I’m more used to ingenues and princess type roles, so this role pushed me to really hold the stage in a different type of way ... Everyone I know in the show has been pushed out of their comfort zone because we’re playing these larger than life fairytale characters.”
“This is one of the most complicated parts I’ve played, personally, because Shrek has so many layers,” said Kian Sullivan, a Wausau East senior who plays the titular ogre. “I’ve usually been cast as the love interest or the nerdy type of guy, but I feel like the opportunity that I was given is helping me expand my horizons.”
For Gosney, a senior at Wausau West, playing the princess Fiona is a very special moment because she grew up watching not so much the animated film, but a recording of the original Broadway show.
“I remember watching it when I was little and thinking ‘Wow, I really want to play Fiona.’ She’s been one of, if not the dream role, since I was a little girl, so its special to end my high school musical career with my dream role,” Gosney said. “She’s very challenging. I could not have done this role a year ago.”
The runaway success of the Shrek film franchise and Broadway musical make this production an appealing draw for families and adults, but it also leaves the stage actors with some big shoes to fill. Approaching such iconic roles, that kids and now even some adults grew up with, is a high bar to meet, but the CWETA players are hopeful the show will give audiences the moments they love while introducing them to something new.
“Our director said to make the characters our version of the movie characters,” Sullivan said. “While we want to give the story its credit, there are still little parts of ourselves we bring into the characters.”
“I think it’s really special that we’re doing a musical version,” Harmon said. “I hope our audience finds something new to resonate with — all the music in the show is really good and I hope they leave feeling it satisfied everything they’d hoped and even exceeded their expectations in everything they thought Shrek would be.”
One of the most enriching parts of being in a CWETA production is the organization’s tradition of bringing in an artist-in-residence to lead workshops and share lessons with the cast during the production. This year, CWETA welcomed actor Eric Petersen, who played Shrek on Broadway and in the first U.S. national tour, among his appearances in TV shows like “The Big Bang Theory” and “Modern Family.”
“I loved Eric Peterson,” Gosney said. “I have been very fortunate to talk to a lot of theater professionals and genuinely that was the most fun I’ve had with anyone. A really cool benefit was that he’d been a part of the original ‘Shrek.’ He came in and knew that show back-to-back. It wasn’t that he was telling us what to do, he was showing us new ways of thinking.”
Petersen worked directly with cast members Jan. 5-9, sharing industry insight and performance techniques drawn from his career.
“He gave a lot of really valuable feedback to every single cast member — not to just the principals,” Sullivan said. “We had masterclasses with him about vocally doing your best and acting to your fullest. One of my favorite mottos from him was ‘If you’re going to mess up, mess up big.’ That really stuck with me because being around an entire auditorium of high schoolers, you may want to hold back a little bit, but one of his main points throughout the week was to go all out — because if you don’t, you don’t know if it’s the right decision, you don’t know what you’re going to miss if you don’t take that risk.”
Petersen worked one-on-one with the principal characters, running through their songs and scenes and offering invaluable feedback and guidance. Gosney said Petersen helped her separate her character, Fiona, from the movie version by discovering parts of herself in the role.
“Everyone wants to see a more genuine performance,” Gosney said. “He said to me, ‘You know how it’s supposed to look, but what is it if you do it?’ That was a fun way to start to think about Fiona. I could take more of my genuine personality and put it in Fiona.”
Additionally, Petersen led numerous daytime workshops with area schools, including Horace Mann Middle School and Franklin Elementary, as part of CWETA’s educational outreach initiative. Horace Mann Band Director Brenna Ohrmundt, who is staging a production of “Beetlejuice Jr,” recalled Petersen working with middle school students, instructing them to be aware of all the different ways basic movement can be used to inform the audience about a character.
“He taught them that something as simple as how you walk can create a different character,” Ohrmundt said.
“That caliber of performer doesn’t wander into a community like Wausau often,” Maegli said. “He was very warm and very inviting and the kids just ate it up.”
For several “Shrek” actors, this show will be their final production with CWETA before moving on to the next stage of their theatrical career. For Harmon, it’s a full circle moment, as “Shrek” was also the first CWETA show she participated in, back in 2016 at age eight. That first experience has given Harmon a deep respect for the impact she can have on younger castmates who have several CWETA and school productions ahead of them.
“I remember looking up greatly to the people who played Shrek and Fiona when I was younger,” Harmon said. “It’s really built me into someone I hope younger kids in this show can look up to. It’s really a great mentorship opportunity and it builds this great community of theater people in central Wisconsin ... Now it’s our turn to give back to those younger kids and foster a good environment and give them the best experience we can with theater.”
Looking back on his high school theater career, Sullivan said theater has given him an opportunity to open up and learn more about who he is, and become more confident in being that person.
“Playing all these different characters with different feelings and goals than mine, it teaches you more about yourself and who you want to be in the future,” he said.
Harmon agreed, adding that acting also helps one understand others by adopting a variety of different perspectives.
“Acting has given me a greater sense of empathy toward people and the world,” she said. “When you step into someone’s story that isn’t yours, you get to learn a lot about the world around you and the people around you. It really helps you have a lot more empathy, you have to put yourself in someone else’s shoes.”
All three students — Gosney, Harmon and Sullivan — plan to continue performing and hope to pursue it as a profession when they head off to college next year. The lessons learned during the production of “Shrek,” and their time with Petersen, will stay with them throughout the coming years. Sullivan even said one specific word of advice from Petersen will help motivate him every time he steps out on stage: Petersen told Sullivan that he is motivated to perform at his best by the possibility that someone in the audience may be experiencing their first-ever play or musical, making that performance especially impactful.
“Your performance could alter their mind to ‘Oh, I love musicals!’ or ‘That wasn’t the best, I might not go see a musical again,’” Sullivan said. “So it is very important you perform your best for the people around you.”
“Shrek the Musical” will be performed at Wausau West High School on Feb. 5-7 and Feb. 12-14 at 7 p.m., as well as 1:30 p.m. matinees on Feb. 8 and 15. For more information, or to purchase tickets, visit cweta.org.
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