Back with Broadway. Company returns with hit musical production in Modesto
Summer entertainment continues to get back to normal in Modesto with a new musical production from the region’s youth.
YES Company – Youth Entertainment Stage Company – presents “Annie” from July 21-24 at the Gallo Center for the Arts.
The troupe hasn’t presented its annual full Broadway production since 2019 because of the coronavirus pandemic. There was no 2020 show and in 2021 it instead offered a 30th anniversary concert.
This will be the first time YES has performed “Annie,” according to Cortney Hurst, director of arts education at the Gallo Center.
“We’re excited to present something the community hasn’t seen from YES Company before,” she said in an email interview.
The production features a cast of 63 students in junior high and high school, ages 12 to 18, she said.
That big cast is part of why they decided to present “Annie” this year. “The show really lends itself to having a large cast with large ensemble groups like the orphans, Hooverville and even the President’s Cabinet,” Hurst said. “It also has so many great feature roles ... That allows for even more students to be featured and challenged to put on a great show.”
Annie lives in a New York City orphanage run by the cruel Miss Hannigan. With a positive outlook and the help of the other girls there, she escapes, finds adventure and eventually a new home with billionaire Oliver Warbucks.
The Tony-winning Broadway production features popular songs including “Tomorrow.” It’s based on a comic strip by Harold Gray and is set in the 1930s. Modesto-born actor Harve Presnell played Daddy Warbucks on Broadway and in touring productions.
Story relevant today
Although it’s an older musical, most of the youths in the cast had heard of “Annie” prior to auditioning, said Hurst, who is producer of the show. “It is a well-known title that has seen a revival on Broadway, several national tours and even a couple movies. With so many versions of Annie, we spent a lot of time on how to make the production our own and not an imitation of other productions.”
The show has been in the news again this month thanks to viral video of “Stranger Things” star Sadie Sink as Annie in a 2012 production of the musical at Theatre Under the Stars in Houston.
Maggie Sniffen, arts education programs manager at the Gallo Center, is directing and choreographing the show.
At the start of rehearsals in June, Sniffen talked to the students about the show’s historical context, Hurst said, “specifically about being set during the Great Depression during the 1930s, the emergence of federal programs spawned by the New Deal and also the importance of the performing arts in that era.
“Even as money was tight for the average American, people flocked to entertainment and the arts to escape the hardships of everyday life.”
The students noted its relevance to today, given the COVID-19 pandemic, she said.
“Vibrant” production
Hurst said audiences can expect “a vibrant, energetic, wholehearted production.”
She also noted the design team and its innovations, including visual projections “of a size and scope that is a first for YES Company. The production design really minimizes the use of physical set pieces and pays homage to the Little Orphan Annie Comics through the artistry in the projections.”
Performances are at 7 p.m. July 21-22, 2 p.m. July 23-24 at the Gallo Center, 1000 I St., Modesto. Tickets are $14-$45, available at galloarts.org.
YES Company is a partnership of the Gallo Center for the Arts and the Stanislaus County Office of Education.
Hurst said the “Annie” cast includes students from Stockton to Merced.
“The YES Company team is very proud of the work these students have put into this show...” she said. “We’re also excited to be back on stage with a full-scale Broadway production for the first time since 2019.”
