39 CommentsWelcome welcome welcome to V120—that’s right folks, it’s time to start anticipating this year’s Varsity Show! The creative team was just announced and this year we’ve got a lot of anticipating to do: the V120 creative team is virtually the same as V119. In fact, Rae Binstock, CC’15, is the only person on the team who has never before participated in a Varsity Show. Here’s your core group, wish them luck and give ’em a high five when you spy them on College Walk:
Director: Emily Feinstein (BC’14): Actor, V116
Producers: Allie Carieri (CC’15): Actor, V118; Ally Engelberg (BC’15): Producer, V119; Renée Kraiem (BC’14): Stage Manager, V119
Composer: Solomon Hoffman (CC’14): Composer, V118
Lyricist: Nick Parker (CC’14): Lyricist, V119
Writers: Rae Binstock (CC’15); Eric Donahue (CC’15): Writer, V119
Choreographer: Lauren Wingenroth (BC’15): Assistant Choreographer, V119
Art Director: Jiin Choi (CC’14): Art Director, V119
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39 Comments
@Anonymous IMHO…as someone involved in student theater but not on creative/production team (ain’t nobody got time for dat): Here’s the thing…who else is there to choose from? Of the pool of applicants, how many are qualified to take on a show at the scale of Varsity Show? CMTS/Xmas/CUPAL put on shows all throughout the year but I barely see new names/faces, it’s always the same people. This doesn’t mean it’s nepotism, it’s just that no one is signing up to be Assistant Director, Assistant Producer, Assistant Designer, etc. which are key roles to take before becoming an actual director or producer of anything, much less the Varsity Show. You really can’t just hand a show with a six-figure budget and stage the size of Roone to someone who has never worked in student theater at Columbia. So instead of going ahead and saying, “they’re just picking their friends” have you ever considered that there is a shortage of directors, producers, writers, designers in the pipeline who are qualified and willing to take on a show at the Varsity Show-scale? I myself was approached to apply for Art Director, and wisely chose not to as that would have made V119 a complete design disaster. Also, people who have worked on Varsity Show tend to want to do Varsity Show again. This isn’t a new thing, and if you look at the team for V118 (arguably the best show in recent years) there is also high number of Varsity Show alumni. Now before you go around arguing that the Varsity Show sucks because they keep selecting the same people, why don’t you consider the fact that these same people just represent the only viable options they have? Now…if they cast the same actors, I’d argue there’s a high level of preference and nepotism, but for production and creative teams, there just aren’t many people to choose from.
@Anonymous @hmm: @hmm: IMHO…as someone involved in student theater but not on creative/production team (ain’t nobody got time for dat): Here’s the thing…who else is there to choose from? Of the pool of applicants, how many are qualified to take on a show at the scale of Varsity Show? CMTS/Xmas/CUPAL put on shows all throughout the year but I barely see new names/faces, it’s always the same people. This doesn’t mean it’s nepotism, it’s just that no one is signing up to be Assistant Director, Assistant Producer, Assistant Designer, etc. which are key roles to take before becoming an actual director or producer of anything, much less the Varsity Show. You really can’t just hand a show with a six-figure budget and stage the size of Roone to someone who has never worked in student theater at Columbia. So instead of going ahead and saying, “they’re just picking their friends” have you ever considered that there is a shortage of directors, producers, writers, designers in the pipeline who are qualified and willing to take on a show at the Varsity Show-scale? I myself was approached to apply for Art Director, and wisely chose not to as that would have made V119 a complete design disaster. Also, people who have worked on Varsity Show tend to want to do Varsity Show again. This isn’t a new thing, and if you look at the team for V118 (arguably the best show in recent years) there is also high number of Varsity Show alumni. Now before you go around arguing that the Varsity Show sucks because they keep selecting the same people, why don’t you consider the fact that these same people just represent the only viable options they have? Now…if they cast the same actors, I’d argue there’s a high level of preference and nepotism, but for production and creative teams, they just can’t seem to find many people to choose from.
@Anonymous V118 was one of the most acclaimed varsity shows in years.
Director: Alex Hare (actor, V116)
Producers: Hillary Kritt (actor, V116) Ben Harris (assistant producer, V117)
Writers: John Goodwin (actor, V115 and V116) and Jeff Stern
Composers: Solomon Hoffman (music director, V117) and Tareq Abuissa
Choreographer: Adrianna Aguilar (assistant choreographer, V117)
The v show is generally better when people know what to expect. Last year the writers, producers, and composers were all rookies and they made a bad show. Quit your bitching. It’s gonna be a great varsity show and this team is great.
@Anonymous How do past V-shows compare? V116-V119?
@Anonymous 118 was incredible. 117 was pretty OK.
@Anonymous But there *is* some new talent on the team. You can’t have a cteam of all new/first time people. These are the people with experience, some in vshow and some in other productions.
@questioning whether they picked the repeats because they are the most qualified or if the only reason they are the most qualified is because they have been done this before. I’m thinking this year was hardest for “new-comers”… doesn’t sound like the new talent had a chance
@Anonymous They had so many great applicants from what I heard and they chose the same people/their friends… NEPOTISM! congrats Varsity Show, nothing has changed…
@Big problem with last year was the writing ……..so they chose one of the same writers.
@hold up For real though, I could care less if they picked repeat Varsity Show people as long as they picked the right ones. I don’t know if they did.
@But There are three people on this team who are new to vshow cteams and have worked with other clubs (nomads, cup, kcst) which is great! If 119 chose to pick themselves (they were all removed from the entire decision making process) then hopefully they did it to make the best show possible.
@Super uncool to chose yourself. now the least you can do is make a musical number or joke about how unfair that is
@Disappointed This is literally the same team as last year…..
@Anonymous Emily Feinstein was abroad last year, so…no
@Ha ha And Allie Carieri was doing KCST Spring Show which is definitely not varsity show
@Anonymous Maybe there’s some means of regulation! Wait a minute, CUPAL to the rescue!
Oh wait, Ally and Allie are on their board.
Let the jerking yourselves off continue.
@CUPAL Is not a governing board and has nothing to do with how member clubs operate or with picking the varsity show cteam for that matter
@CUPAL Also doesn’t “regulate”
@Warren G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1plPyJdXKIY
@three producers? It’s been two every other time I’ve cared to look. Were there just three equally good people or was two not enough to handle the workload the last time?
@Anonymous They probably couldn’t decide between the three
@Anonymous I couldn’t care less about the circlejerk that is the Columbia theater committee.What’s really annoying is the colon usage in this post.
@yay! Rae Binstock is gonna KILL as a writer. You’d be hard-pressed to find someone better for the job out there.
@Anonymous Well someone is going to have to balance out Weather Machine.
@Anonymous These are amazing, talented people and they’ll definitely put on a great show. That being said, it’s obvious the Columbia theater community is one big circlejerk. It’s disappointing to see so many repeats when you know these are not the only talented people on this campus.
@Derek I mean Flerek Were you hoping Bwog would cover snobby business douchebags?
@This is Shame-less ne-po-ti-sm. last year’s staff essentially chose themselves/their friends again. I hope the theater community actually does something about these shitty politics that run this shit.
@KCST will be at 1020 all night.
@Dawning of a new age There’s a kcster on the team again this year so everyone will be at 1020.
@1,020 **1,020
@1,020 *1,020
@hmm last year’s writer, lyricist, producer, and art director.
way to foster new talent!
@V fan Sad to see some people missing from this list. The producers can’t beat 119
@Anonymous can’t beat it? why not. they made that show last year. and the band gave them good comments. probably can be revised before deadline for an a- (or b+ if you have a hard teacher).
@Hi so It’s Wingenroth guys
@Alexander Pines fixed!
@This is an INCREDIBLE team! Congratulations to all!!
@Anonymous Rae actually helped with the build team and backstage in V117. Much congrats to the entire team!
@Anonymous It was V118 — she wasn’t at Columbia for V117