By Katherine Beeson
Last year saw the cancellations of a myriad of live theater performances. A brave new group not only forged ahead with just such an endeavor, but scheduled its premiere production while the world was still in quarantine!
Ghostlight Theatre Co. presented the two-person musical, “The Last Five Years” earlier this year. The show initially ran with a limited live audience and will now be available online for the rest of 2021.
Ghostlight Theatre Co. was founded by local actor Joseph Gallo. It is a semi-professional, non-profit group with no fixed performance location but will center on Washington County and the surrounding areas. “The beauty of Ghostlight is that it’s a company that is not bound by a geographic jurisdiction or a genre of shows,” Gallo said. “I am looking at which titles the company would like to do, as well as which titles the community at large would appreciate and like to see onstage. As far as I’m concerned, the sky is the limit. I am hoping to have one play and one musical each year.”
Gallo is looking ahead and has a dream list of future productions. “I would love to bring the works of Eugene O’Neill, Arthur Miller, and Laura Gunderson to the stage.”
The history of the term “ghost light” is long and varied. It began many years ago as a safety measure; theaters would always leave one single light burning on any open, unused stage so that no one would be stumbling around in the dark. Others soon claimed that the light, originally gas, was left on low to reduce the pressure in the gas tanks in the building. Of course, many theater folk also adhere to the superstition that a light must be left on to placate the theater ghosts that frequently are thought to haunt the space.
Gallo captures the imagination of the term with his group’s name and his tagline: “Keeping the Lights on.” “The Last Five Years” by Jason Robert Brown is a musical told from two points of view and from two opposite ends of a relationship. Cathy, an actress, opens the show at the end of their story by lamenting in “Still Hurting” that, “Jamie is over and Jamie is gone” while Jamie, an aspiring writer, strolls in and begins their romance by singing that he is breaking his Jewish mother’s heart and his grandfather is rolling in his grave because he has fallen for a “Shiksa Goddess.” The couple then experience career highs (his) and lows (hers) as they try to balance life and love.
Cathy (Kathryn Flynn) and Jamie (Joseph Gallo) are wonderful as they play these young lovers. For most of the musical, each takes the stage alone and must move their relationship forward and back. The only time their character “lines” intersected within this musical on-stage “graft” was on their wedding day when they embraced and sang the beautiful “A Miracle Would Happen” and “When You Come Home to Me.”
Their voices seemed a bit rough and strained at times, but this actually helped to convey the emotion each character was feeling. The songs eliminated the need for much dialogue and Flynn and Gallo moved the dual stories along beautifully.
I thoroughly enjoyed this performance. Experiencing a musical, or any theatrical presentation in this online manner, is not without some issues. There was some sound echoing interference early on and I missed reading a program. However, director David Pecsi used the camera angles successfully and created scenes that shifted seamlessly and smoothly. Kudos also to musical director Joshua Parman. The orchestra was wonderful. A shout-out to the cameraperson is also in order!
“The Last Five Years” is available for online viewing by visiting https://www.showtix4u.com/event-details/48032