Rock Opera Hits the Stage at Playhouse 22

Most theaters, professional or community, fill their regular seasons with beloved musicals and well-known plays aimed at filling the maximum number of seats with the broadest possible audience.

But in summer months, once the regular season ends, theaters with otherwise dark stages are often inclined to fulfill the other obligation of a playhouse: giving ambitious artists the chance to bring a new work to life.

This summer, Playhouse 22, the community theater in residence at East Brunswick’s Cultural Center on Cranbury Road, will do just that. Beginning July 15, Razia’s Shadow, a rock musical directed by Greg Scalera, begins a limited five performance run. The production will be the first full stage adaptation of the 2008 rock opera album of the same name by the Seattle-based indie rock band Forgive Durden.

It’s a set of performances that Scalera has been waiting for since he first heard the albums.

“I was a fan of the band before this album ever came out, I’ve just always liked their music,” said Scalera, who hails from Colonia and currently resides in Cranford. “I used to be in a touring band and we gigged with them once or twice. All of the music and narration in the show were written by the singer songwriter of the band, Thomas Dutton.”

In Scalera’s promotional material for the production, he describes the story as the tale of, "a world divided in two by the selfish actions of a powerful yet insecure angel. After generations of turmoil, the love and sacrifice of a brave couple driven by a sense of destiny may be enough to bring peace to the world once again.”

While he’s never directed a full-scale stage musical before, what attracted Scalera most to the idea of staging the album was the combination of its universal message and specific medium. “It was just something really different,” he said. “It’s just a different way of saying something that I think a lot of people agree with. The story deals with trying to bring different people together, and that’s much what the project is about. We’re trying to marry the theater world and the rock world. I’ve always been interested in bridging them.”

While the album itself is a rock opera with a clearly linear story, the band itself had never conceived of it as a stage production. “I kind of built it from scratch, to be honest,” Scalera said. “The album itself is written in the structure of a musical, it’s just that no one ever attempted to mount it. As soon as I heard the album back when it came out I knew I wanted to produce it eventually. It was just a matter of waiting for the right time, and that came up about a year ago.”

It was then that Scalera performed in Playhouse 22’s production of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and met one of the Playhouse’s producers, Ray Dobrovolsky. “I went back and contacted Ray,” Scalera said. “He was on board with the show, he got the rest of the board’s approval, and it kind of went from there.”

The next hurdle Scalera faced was finding the talent to embody the production in his mind. “We got really lucky with our audition turnout,” he said. “I was expecting a lot of folks from school, people I knew. I got a lot of new faces, a lot of people I’ve never worked with before. A lot of people I’ve seen in shows before and been amazed by.”

He was also surprised by the speed with which the cast got up to speed on the material. “I set aside way more time than I needed to teach them the music,” he said. “They picked it up very quickly. It’s really a rock show. Rock vocals. Not musical theater at all. We got really lucky.”

With a few weeks to go before opening night, Scalera feels very confident about the dream production he is about to realize. He only hopes Forgive Durden ultimately feels the same.  “We’ve invited them out to a couple rehearsals, they’re going to try to come to see the show,” he said. “I think once they see the show they’ll be more excited by the quality of the work we’re doing. I don’t think they really know what to expect.”

Razia’s Shadow opens at Playhouse 22 on July 15. There will be performances the evenings of the 15t, 16t, and 17, and matinees on the 16 and 17. For more information, call the playhouse at 732-54-3939 or visit them at www.playhouse22.org.