Tipperary audiences were left spellbound by Oliver performances

A scene from Oliver at the White Memorial Theatre

placeholder image — A scene from Oliver at the White Memorial Theatre

Clonmel High School and Presentation students combine to put on a marvellous spectacle

They say it takes a village to raise a child. And what I have learned over the past few weeks is that it also takes a village to put on a good show.

Once again this year, I had the pleasure of taking part in the joint school show between the CBS Highschool and The Presentation Secondary School in Clonmel. I played the part of Bill Sikes in this year’s production of “Oliver”. And we could not have asked for a better team.

Allow me to set the scene: It is around 7:50 in the evening on Thursday the 24th of October. Our final show is only ten minutes away. The entire cast is huddled into the dressing room below the stage, and already a lot of people have done a lot of work. Us lads have just had all of our makeup done by the team of Molly O’Connor & Zuzanna Flack.

We have been given our microphones, now knowing that we are in the safe hands of sound engineer Eoin Barry. The backstage team, headed by Tracy O’Leary have set the stage for the first scene and the props department headed by Coralie McNamara and Sharon Burke have ensured that everyone who needs a small silver bowl for the first scene has received theirs.

Our beloved director, Daniel O’Brien gives us one last rousing speech, and our musical director Siobhán Alley takes us through the Memorare prayer as is tradition before any show in the white memorial.

Alissa Keating does a vocal warmup with us, and finally to bring the energy up before we go onstage, Grace Kennedy (who is playing the character Bet) leads us through chants of eight. Then, and only then, can the show begin.

I make a point of wishing good luck to Bartosz Hoc and Sean Savage, who will be playing Oliver and for this last show. The roles had been double cast, so Evan Scully and Cillian Flavin had already taken their final bows as those characters during Thursday’s Matinee.

From the wings, I watch the lights (being controlled by Alan McCormack) come up, Miss Alley counts in the band and so the show begins. Throughout the night, the cast sings the songs taught to us by Siobhán Alley and Olga Gannon, executes the dances taught to us by Keisha O’ Shea and Chloe O’ Sullivan and brings Daniel O'Brian's vision for the show to life. As Bill Sikes, I don’t have much to do until act two, but act one slips by in an instant as I listen in to the hilarious scenes between Nathan Dalton (playing Mr Bumble), Chloe Duggan (playing Widow Corney) and Aaron Fahey, Mia Goldbach and Micahel Looby Anderson (who played the Sowerberry family).

I begin Act two waiting to enter through the caboose, while listening to Millie O’ Sullivan raise the roof with her rendition of Oom Pah Pah. My scenes pass by in a blur, but certain moments stand out.

I distinctly remember feeling as though the reprise of “It’s A Fine Life”, sung between myself, Millie and Keenan Scully (who played Fagin) sounded extremely powerful. Speaking of Keenan Scully as Fagin, the scene which followed was his big solo number “Reviewing The Situation”. Unbeknownst to Keenan, what can only be described as a dance party had gathered backstage. We all loved his rendition of the song so much that this dance party had become tradition over the run of shows, and had only grown bigger as the week went on (much to the amusement of backstage supervisors Diarmuid Bolger and Regina Tobin.)

And then before I know it, my character has been shot (by a slightly too gleeful Conor Lacey), and it is time for bows.

Taking my final bow, all that was running through my mind was all of the people I have mentioned above, everyone on the front of house team, all of the sponsors and all of the great audiences who came to the show we had throughout the week. I also found myself admiring the set which Anthony Lawless constructed for the final time. I could not have been luckier to have been part of such an amazing team of people.