McCoy High School ready to open production of Cinderella

Monsignor McCoy High School is putting on a production of Cinderella this year with the first performance on Dec. 1 for the community and schools.

Grade 12 student Lacey Holowaty landed the role of the stepmother, and it has been an adjustment to immerse herself in the role.

“She’s mean but she knows what she wants, she’s very direct and has a plan, and deep down she just wants what is best for her family. It’s been interesting because playing a character who is always mean and negative, it’s not really who I am,” explained Holowaty. “Her mannerisms and her cadences and how I think she would talk, those accent things I’m trying to figure out.”

Playing a character who is consistently unkind to another person is challenging for Holowaty, who explained it’s important for her to solidify real-life relationships.

“When you are in that mindset, it’s important to build solid relationships with other cast members so you have that trust to do what you feel is necessary and they know I’m just acting.”

This is her last musical at McCoy and Holowaty understands it will be a hard goodbye at the end, but she is excited about the performance.

For the second year in a row, Grade 12 student Abigal Duhaine is the stage manager for the McCoy musical.

“This year we have more students, we have about 60 students this year, we are almost split in half with 30 cast and 30 crew members, Last year I only worked with about 15 crew members and this year I’m doubling that. We are trying to do more this year — bigger sets, more costumes, bigger and better,” stated Duhaine.

The advantage of having so many more people is the crew isn’t struggling with deadlines and she feels they will be ready to move everything to the college theatre for technical and dress rehearsals on Nov. 30. Cinderella was chosen for this year’s production partly because they had a large cast, which enables them to have more ensembles. Additionally, they also wanted to have a family friendly show for the whole community to enjoy.

This is also Duhaine’s last musical at McCoy and she is “excited, but sad at the same time. Excited it’s my last year and we are putting on this great performance of Cinderella, sad it will be my last since I’m not 100% sure I’ll go back into doing musicals within the community.”

Shows are on Dec. 1 and 4 at 7 p.m., and Dec. 2 at 3 p.m. in the Eresman Theatre at Medicine Hat College. Tickets are $15 and available through McCoy’s school office or through SchoolCash online.