Local children sing and dance to film ‘Broadway Movie Musical’

The movie will be shown at San Jose’s Oakridge Mall Jan. 22 and 29

Published in the August 24 – September 6, 2016 issue of Gilroy Life

Alexa Booth stood in front of the orphans and struck a movie clapboard. As the 10-year-old stepped off the stage, a dozen other girls on their knees started singing. In unison developed through weeks of rehearsals, they scrubbed the stage floor with rags and buckets.

“It’s the hard-knock life, for us. It’s the hard-knock life, for us….” the girl belted out the famous tune from the musical “Annie.” They were being filmed the afternoon of Aug. 13 at the Morgan Hill Playhouse as part of John Bisceglie’s latest cinematic creation, “Broadway Movie Musical,” a salute to the American musical.

About 190 young people, ages 5 to 18, from San Francisco, San Jose, Morgan Hill and Gilroy are performing in the movie Bisceglie is directing that shows the evolution of American musical theater. The children’s movie pays tribute to beloved classics such as “Oklahoma!” and “Fiddler on the Roof” that have come to define Broadways as well as contemporary shows such as “Rent” and “Hamilton” that are bringing new life to the art form, Bisceglie said.

This is the first time Booth, a student at Gilroy’s Luigi Aprea Elementary School, has ever worked on a film production and she found it exciting but also demanding. She and other cast members rehearsed a couple of hours one day a week for about two months to prepare for the filming, much of which is done in front of green screens so filmmakers Mattie Scariot and Nils Myers of Gilroy’s 152 West Productions can add computer-generated imagery later.

“It’s really fun and it’s a lot of work, too,” Booth said. “When they’re shooting you and you’re singing and smiling, it just gives you a weird feeling in your stomach. You’re happy but you’re also nervous.”

Casey Templin, 6, a first-grader at Morgan Hill’s Nordstrom Elementary School, is part of the “Annie” orphans. She belts out “Hard Knock Life” with relish.

Kristina Alvarez, her mother, said Templin got interested in the performing arts when she took dancing classes at Lana’s Dance Studio.

“John is really, really great with the kids,” Alvarez said. “They get a sense of pride. And they’ll get to see themselves on the big screen. My daughter is a little bit on the shy side, but when it comes to performing, she really shines. It’s been a fun experience for her.”

This is the third musical movie for Bisceglie using local children. The first was a spoof of the TV show “Glee” called “Gleeful.” The movie “Roar” was a revue salute to the black and white movie musicals of 1920s Hollywood. He has also created live musical shows with children, including an ambitious show where garlic grower Christopher Ranch’s warehouse was turned into an Egyptian temple. Bisceglie has a policy to cast every child who might want to be in one of his stage performances or musical films.

“We do a movie maybe every three years,” he said. “It’s a lot of work and really time consuming, but it’s kind of a combination of having the technology and the interest. I’m always about doing projects that are different and unique and excite my staff and myself in the creative process.”

With “Broadway Movie Musical,” he worked with 152 West Productions to film children in three cities to make three different films. About 60 from Morgan Hill, San Martin and Gilroy worked on the South Valley version, 60 were in San Francisco’s version, and as many as 90 performed in the San Jose version of the movie musical. Children recorded their songs in a professional recording studio in San Jose and later lip-synced as they danced on stage for the camera.

The movie will include about 34 songs from a variety of Broadway shows. There are more than 2,000 wigs and costumes used for the filming.

Making three versions of the same movie was a labor of love for Bisceglie and his film crew, he said.

“It would be hard to have 190 kids in one movie because it would water down what they would get and part of it is the opportunity to have big roles and sing a lot,” he said. “It’s hard on us to film it three times, but we basically have to have the costumes work for three sets of casts, set up the set three times, film it three times, record it three times, edit it three times.”

The show will premiere at the Century Cinema at San Jose’s Oakridge Mall Jan. 22 and 29. It will also play at the Cinemark in downtown Redwood City Feb. 5.

Angelina Tawney, 12, a sixth-grader at Britton Middle School in Morgan Hill developed a love of singing and dancing by participating in several of Bisceglie’s shows as well as “Oliver!” for the South Valley Civic Theatre a few years ago.

“I get to be with my friends and I get to do something I love,” she said. “It’s fun. Every show I’ve done with John, at least one of my friends has been in it.”

Her mother, Debbie Tawney, added of her daughter’s experience performing in “Broadway Movie Musical,” “I think it gives them the experience of film and recording and being on stage. You don’t usually get the opportunity to do all three. They’re going to get the chance in January to see themselves on the big screen at the Oakridge Mall.”

Anthony Freitas, a Gilroy resident who is a student at Valley Christian School, performed first with Bisceglie at age 10 in the movie “Gleeful.” For “Broadway Movie Musical,” he’ll perform in hit song-and-dance numbers from the shows “Grease,” “Hairspray,” and “West Side Story.”

“It’s never really nerve-wracking for me. I just like to be up there and perform,” he said. “The variety of songs is just so large. You can go from rapping in one scene from ‘Hamilton’ to ‘Summer Nights’ from ‘Grease.’”

Being in a movie is different than performing in front of a live audience because the camera is the focus, he said.
“If you mess up in theater, that audience will see it and that’s it. But for a movie, you get a chance to be perfect,” he said. “You can do several takes.”

Freitas encourages families to bring their children to the movie when it comes out next year and introduce them to Broadway musical tunes.

“I think a lot of people should come and see this show because it’s a showcase of all of our talents,” he said. “We’ve put so much work into this that it’s something that people should see.”