On September 9th, the cast list for the fall musical, Guys & Dolls, was posted on the TG theatre website. The Totino-Grace theatre program has been praised for its successful productions, such as Godspell, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and The Addams Family, so there were many talented people competing to be part of this production.

Guys & Dolls is the first “classic Broadway” show to be performed at TG in four years. The show is set in New York City and features all sorts of people, from missionaries to gamblers to burlesque dancers. The music is jazzy, the comedy is clever, and the characters are some of the most recognizable in Broadway history. It is the story of reluctantly lovestruck Sarah Brown, suave Sky Masterson, disgruntled Miss Adelaide, and good ol’ reliable Nathan Detroit!

The audition process lasted three days until the director, Christine Karki, finally came to her decision. Cast respectively as the four leads are seniors Mary Kittridge, Ben Kroll, Anne Mitchell, and Ben Stagg.

Ben Kroll is playing Sky Masterson, the confident gambler tasked with winning the heart of Miss Sarah Brown. “[My character] is kind of on top of the world and confident in himself. He makes very risky bets and they usually pay off,” says Ben. He has been involved in theatre productions since 5th grade, when he was in The King and I at his school. Ben has been involved in show choir all four years of high school, was in the 2016 All-State Mens Choir, plays 6 instruments, and is one of the co-writers of our school song, “One Call, Many Voices”. Ben is very excited to be in Guys & Dolls and his favorite song in the show is “Sue Me”.

Mary Kittridge has been cast as Skye/Ben K’s love interest, Sarah Brown. Sarah is a missionary and heartily disapproves of the gamblers sinful antics and faces a moral dilemma after starting to fall for Skye. Mary has been in theatre productions since she was 9 years old and was awarded an Outstanding Honor from the Spotlight Musical Theatre Program last year for her role as Alice in The Addams Family. Mary is very happy to be in this show and says, “I think the cast is really great and there are a lot of new people, which is really awesome, especially working with the freshmen and sophomores!”

Ben Stagg plays the role of Nathan Detroit, Adelaide’s flighty fiance and the boss of the oldest established permanent floating crap game in New York. Ben describes him as “madly in love with his fiance and always trying to please everyone, which causes problems.” He has been involved in theatre since 3rd grade, when he played a munchkin. Ben says the audition process was stressful because there were many parts and many talented people auditioning. He is most looking forward to the song “Luck Be a Lady” because “Ben [Kroll] is going to perform it really well!” Ben says the cast is very diverse in their talent and he’s looking forward to working with all of them!

Anne Mitchell is playing the iconic role of Miss Adelaide, the dancer who has been engaged to Nathan Detroit for 14 years. Her first shows were in elementary school when she was Gretel in The Sound of Music and sang the “Interjection Song” in School House Rock. Her favorite song in the musical is “Marry The Man Today” because she sings it with Mary, her best friend. She says, “The story is about love and it is shown in many different forms. It kind of shows that love doesn’t make sense no matter what form it is in!”

All of the leads agree that memorizing all their lines will be tough and that their favorite part of musical theatre is the loving, close-knit community.
Performances are November 2nd through the 5th.