With Christmas approaching fast, a white Christmas is on every one’s mind, especially within the JC community.
This year, instead of the usual fall musical, Associate Director of Enrollment and fall musical director Kim Brueggemann decided to put on a winter show, “White Christmas.”
“I was extremely excited because I knew Mrs. B had wanted to do it [“White Christmas”] for years and years. It’s the kind of show that keeps you engaged the whole time,” junior Thomas Gardner said.
According to Brueggemann, the decision to have the show in December was based on the fact that “White Christmas” was the chosen play.
“The show dates were chosen strictly for the fact that I decided to produce “White Christmas,” which is a Christmas-time show. To have produced this show in the fall wouldn’t have had the same impact,” Brueggemann said.
In order to get the word about “White Christmas” out to the community, Brueggemann contacted ABC 2 News anchor and reporter Kelly Swoope.
“The publicity for this show began with a friend of mine giving me a direct contact to ABC Channel 2 News. I contacted Kelly Swoope and everything went from there,” Brueggemann said.
“A few weeks prior to the day at the studio, Ms. B told the cast that she’d been trying to get us on television. At the time, it was only an idea, nothing definite or concrete. But about a week or so before we went to the studio, she told us it was official – we’d be aired on ABC 2 News, both the Good Morning Maryland Show and the 11 o’clock news,” sophomore Lindsey McCumber said.
According to producer and head of ticket sales Laura Lang, the theme and later date of the show generated more ticket sales.
“I don’t think we would have gotten the same response [in ticket sales] if we had not done a Christmas-themed show. Not sure what we will plan for next year yet – we’ll let the dust settle on this one first,” Lang said.
Similar to previous plays, “every show had extremely full houses,” according to Brueggemann. The final tally of tickets was not completed when The Patriot went to press.
Also new to the play this year was a dinner theater before the Saturday night showing, sponsored by the Patriot Parent Association. The dinner was held in the gym and guests were offered drinks, salad, ziti, and breadsticks. According to Brueggemann, the Saturday night showing sold out.
“It [the Dinner Theater] went well for our first attempt at it. It was a fun thing, but there is room to tweak some things in the future,” Brueggemann said.
Emily Clarke is a Managing Editor for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.