Dover-Sherborn Brings “Big Fish” Tale to Stage

The hit Broadway show BIG FISH, a fantastical musical adventure, comes to the Sherborn Community Center August 23rd through August 26th. A big-hearted musical about family, this production itself is a family affair featuring multiple pairs of siblings on stage and brother-sister duo Scott Walker and Lauryn Grace as Director and Choreographer respectively.

Big Fish tells the story of father and storyteller Edward Bloom. Bloom’s larger-than-life tales about meeting witches, kissing mermaids, and joining the circus come to life on stage and give his son Will pause. Will spends the show longing to learn the truth behind the fairy tales. The show Big Fish celebrates family, love, and mining the extraordinary in everyday life.

“This show is not as well known, but it is heartwarming, it’s family-friendly, it’s funny, it’s sad, so you really get a wide range of emotions. There’s something in it for everyone,” said Walker.

Walker has been directing the Dover-Sherborn Summer Drama program for 16 years and looks for shows that are fun, lively, and upbeat and offer talented, committed student actors lots of time in front of audiences. Students in the program work together three full days a week preparing the show from early July to the end of August. This group of passionate actors, crew members, and volunteers love doing theater and build tight bonds over the course of the summer, becoming their own little family.

And then there are those that are already family. Siblings Walker and Grace have been close their entire lives and have directed and choreographed together since Lauryn was in sixth grade and Scott was a sophomore in high school.

“As siblings we understand each other’s personalities and visions, while also having our own ideas. It is a great way for us to spend time with each other. As people get older and have their own families, they don’t always get to spend time with their siblings. Scott and I have always remained close and being able to work with him is a nice way to make time for us to see each other,” said Grace.

“Not only is it a great thing to work with her and get time with her, but we have a rhythm to the way we work at this point. She just gets what the show is supposed to be and how it should look. I think the best way to describe it is an enormous relief,” said Walker.

In Sherborn, some siblings have performed together for more than a decade.

“I’ve been around the summer drama program for as long as I can remember,” says Bradley Hodson-Walker who is portraying Edward Bloom in Big Fish. He was only five years old when he watched his older sister, Annabel, take to the stage for the first time at the Sherborn Community Center in Godspell in 2011.

Bradley is the youngest of four siblings to participate continuously for the past 13 years in the DS Summer Drama program. Entering his senior year, Big Fish will be his sixth and final summer production before graduating.

Four out of the five Sawan siblings also spent time on stage together in the summer. Steven, the second eldest, is now a working actor, and his youngest sister Bella takes the stage this summer as the Witch. “This summer program has definitely shaped members of our family,” said mom Michelle Sawan.

This year’s show features two sibling pairs who will perform on stage together: Miranda and Dash Savla and Jonah and Lee Brown.

In Big Fish, her fourth summer show, Miranda plays Josephine. This will be Dash’s second summer show. He plays Young Will and Karl, the giant. “Being on stage we both just slip into being performers. It’s more during rehearsals where we’re elbowing each other and getting in each other’s way,” said Miranda of acting with Dash. Watching the Brown brothers interact off stage, she said, “I know this feeling.”

In his third summer show, Jonah Brown, cast as Edward Bloom, plays his brother Lee Brown’s father. In his Dover-Sherborn Summer Drama debut, Lee plays Young Will, and later in the show, portrays his own son. On alternate nights, he performs as Karl. A third Brown sibling waits in the wings for her turn to perform alongside her brothers.

“There’s family in this room,” said Walker, “I am looking forward to seeing Jonah play Lee’s father.”

“It makes the chemistry much more realistic; hopefully, by the time the show rolls around he’ll actually hug me onstage,” said Jonah.

In addition to the family dynamics at work in the show, audiences can look forward to lots of surprises.

Since the show will be produced “In-the-round”, with the audience seated just feet from the actors, there is not a moment when audiences won’t have a front row seat for the action and everybody–cast and audience–will experience the show differently. Dash Savla encourages viewers to “look out for little scenes” happening in the midst of the big production numbers.

The costumes for the show are “extremely complicated”, said Walker. He credited Sheridan Miller and the Dover Foundation for ensuring that 30 cast members, each with at least five costume changes, have something fabulous to wear. Costumes range from the wild west, to the 1950s, to a WWII USO show, to the circus.

Similarly, the music for the show, which will be performed by a live orchestra headed by Michael Jones, spans genres from rock to country. The music and lyrics for the show are by Andrew Lippa.

“There is literally every kind of music in this show – from rock to country and then an all-out tap number. The audience is going to come in and sit in these seats a few feet from this stage and every second is something new and cool and interesting,” said Walker.

Catch 'Big Fish' with family and friends at the Sherborn Community Center. Show dates are opening night Wednesday, August 23rd; Thursday, August 24th; Friday, August 25th; and closing night Saturday, August 26th. All performances are in the evening starting at 7:30pm. Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased online at www.ticketstage.com or at the door.

Big Fish was written by John August. The show is based on the novel by Daniel Wallace and the Columbia Motion Picture by John August. Big Fish is presented through special arrangement with and authorized performance materials are supplied by Theatrical Rights Worldwide, 1180 Avenue of the Americas, Suite 640, New York, New York 10036.

News Article written by Amanda Christy Brown, Parent Volunteer