Premier Centre for the Arts returns with Holiday Cabaret

Before heading into the New Year, the Premier Centre for the Arts expects to end the Christmas season in a bang, offering 22 live selections of contemporary holiday tunes, executed by a glowing cast of 20 performers. 

PCA’s second annual Holiday Cabaret will be held tonight at 7 p.m. and Saturday. The show onNew Year’s Eve will be followed by a party with champagne and hors d'oeuvres.

Holiday playlist
If you were to see Santa Claus’ iPod and browse through the top songs in his holiday playlist, it’d likely include several tunes featured in Holiday Cabaret, such as: “Deck the Rooftop” from the TV show “Glee”, Josh Groban’s “Believe” and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You”. The cabaret will also include classics like Bobby Helms’ “Jingle Bell Rock” and Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”.   

Nick Manacheria (assistant director of the event) said guests will enjoy the show since its stacked playlist will offer a musical experience unlike any other theater group in the area.

“You can’t beat it,” Manacheria said. “It’s local entertainment.” 

The creation process
Mancheria said the songs in Holiday Cabaret were selected as a collaborative effort between the show’s cast, the centre’s staff and its customers (students), in which they all listed their favorite holiday jams.

After finalizing the playlist, Mancheria directed his attention to choreographing dance steps for the production. For “Deck the Rooftop” he turned to YouTube and studied “Glee’s” music video for the tune to get an idea of how he wanted his performers to move during the song, he said.

Mancheria crafted a hip-hop inspired dance for the song, drawing from various theater workshops he has attended, as well as stage productions he has watched over the years. He also used the knowledge gained from attending workshops and seeing stage productions to help choreograph his other dances in the show.   

Trish Moore, 44, a cast member in Holiday Cabaret with her 15-year-old daughter, Kerry, said “Deck the Rooftop” is a showstopper.

“It’s perpetual movement that has lots of clapping and hip-hop moves,” said Trish of Middletown. “It’s a crazy and very [youthful] dance that’s worth the price of admission.”

Dance steps for each song in the show was designed to be accessible for both children and adult performers in the production, since the cast is comprised of performers between the ages of 9 and 40-plus, Mancheria said.

Trish says Mancheria’s personality makes performing in the show a blast.

“Fun, fun, fun — that’s what he personifies,” she said. “He keeps it light and he’s filled with energy and he never lets you give up.”

Young at heart
Though Trish is older than several members of the cast, she brings the kind of passion and enthusiasm to the stage that rivals that of even the youngest performer.

What’s her secret to performing with such gusto? She says it’s simply singing.

“This kind of stuff is what keeps me youthful,” Trish said.

Another aspect of the show that gives Trish energy is sharing the stage with Kerry. Having made her centre debut in 2010 in the production “Sound of Music” — her favorite production of all time, in which Kerry was also cast in the show – Trish said the experience was so heartwarming that she jumped at the chance to perform in Holiday Cabaret to bond with her daughter.

“We did “Sound of Music” last year and it went beautifully,” she said.“The reason we’re doing [Holiday Cabaret] is for some quality mother-daughter time before she goes off to college.”