Halifax Repertory Theatre debuts with Broadway musical revue

DAYTONA BEACH  — For Jack Cook, life’s road has taken plenty of different turns.

There was a college degree in musical theater, a six-year enlistment in the U.S. Marine Corps, a stint as a high-school social studies teacher and ultimately a career as a lawyer. As fulfilling as those endeavors have been, the lure of theater stage lights always beckoned.

Now, Cook, 44, and his wife, Sandy, are among a dedicated team of theater loyalists embracing that dream as the forces behind the newly established Halifax Repertory Theatre.

The company will introduce itself to audiences this weekend with the debut of “I HRT Broadway,” a musical revue steeped in the theater world’s most beloved classic and contemporary hits. Performances are slated for Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the News-Journal Center in Daytona Beach.

“This is where our heart is; this where our passion is,” Cook said of the new theater company. “Being on that stage, connecting with that audience. It really is that escape that everyone needs right now.”

Seeds for Halifax Rep planted in Daytona Beach

For the Cooks, the love of theater started at Seabreeze High School in Daytona Beach, where they met in school’s theater program and performed together in school productions in the mid-1990s. At Seabreeze, they also met another theater student, Kelly Parsons Kwiatek, who now is also among the leaders of the new Halifax Repertory Theatre.

For Seabreeze students at the time, the school productions eventually led to more roles in local productions as part of the Children’s Musical Theatre Workshop of Ormond Beach and Seaside Music Theater, the latter a beloved longtime institution that closed its doors due to a lack of funding in 2008.

“In the 1980s and ‘90s, this was a really big theater town,” said Sandy Cook, who retired from her career as a paralegal to work full-time to help launch Halifax Repertory Theatre. “There were multiple shows going on all the time.”

Now, amid booming development and growth in Volusia County, organizers envision the new theater company as a potential force in a revitalization of the area’s theater scene, the Cooks said.

The company recently moved into its own rehearsal studio, a 4,500-square foot space that once housed a martial arts academy in the Ormond Oaks shopping center on U.S. Highway 1 in Ormond Beach.

By November, the theater company hopes to have completed renovations that will include dedicated rooms to offer private voice lessons, workshops, classes and boot camps for aspiring actors. A 501c3 nonprofit corporation, Halifax Rep aims to forge partnerships with the community, area businesses and arts organizations to foster a “thriving artistic ecosystem” in Ormond Beach, the Cooks said. 

“The artistic health of the community is key to its growth overall,” Jack Cook said. “There’s already a cultural renaissance underway and we want to be a part of it.”

Musical revue promises fast-paced family-friendly fare

This weekend, “I HRT Broadway” will offer a fast-paced, family-friendly sampling of the music, dance and drama that defines the theater’s magic for so many of its fans, according to those in the production.

The production will feature hits from more than two dozen musicals in consideration for the company’s debut season in 2024.

Material represents shows that include “42nd Street,” “Guys & Dolls,” “Les Misérables,” “Hairspray,” “Something Rotten!” “Secret Garden,” “School of Rock,” “Mean Girls” and “Matilda,” among others.

The show is suitable for all ages, said Jack Cook.

“It covers 32 numbers from 27 different Broadway musicals,” he said. “There’s a lot of comedy, a lot of adorable kids, a lot of tapping (tap-dancing).”

In a dress rehearsal this week, the show segued from the top hats and old-school charm of “Brush Up Your Shakespeare (from 1948’s “Kiss Me, Kate”) to the graceful vocals and choreography of Cole Porter’s “It’s De-Lovely” (from 1936’s “Red Hot and Blue”). In the contemporary realm, an exuberant student chorus powered “Revolting Children” from 2010’s “Matilda the Musical.”

The show’s 28-member cast ranges from student actors to equity performers such as Chelsea Turbin, an Ormond Beach native and Seabreeze High School graduate whose credits include performances in seven countries with the international Broadway touring production of Green Day’s “American Idiot.”

Turbin, 33, is among the cast members who hope that the new company will offer opportunities and exposure to the arts for aspiring local actors in the same way that she was once inspired.

“This is really coming full circle for me,” she said. “I was extremely lucky to be in a community that allowed me to dip my toes into theater at the age of 13, working with people who had traveled from Broadway to work in Daytona Beach at Seaside Music Theater. This is so important, to have something like this here.”

Cast members in the musical revue also include Jill Kachanouskaya, 34, of Palm Coast.

Another product of Seabreeze High School, she graduated with a music theater degree from Elon University in Greensboro, North Carolina, and traveled the world entertaining on Holland America cruise ships before returning home to become the theater director at her alma mater, Seabreeze.

In “I HRT Broadway,” Kachanouskaya will be performing alongside some of her students.

“It’s an invaluable thing to have professional theater in the area,” she said. “Otherwise, students will never know, ‘What does it look like?’ If you don’t see it, you don’t know it. So this is huge.”

If you go

WHAT: “I HRT Broadway,” musical revue presented by the Halifax Repertory Theatre.

WHEN: 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 1 p.m. Sunday

WHERE: Davidson Theater at News-Journal Center, 221 N. Beach St. Daytona Beach

COST: Reserved seating $30 adults, $25 for ages 17 and younger. Group rate of $25 per ticket for groups of 15 or more. Also, a group rate of $20 per ticket for teachers bringing students to the performance. All prices include fees.

ONLINE: halifaxrep.com 

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Halifax Repertory Theatre debuts with Broadway revue in Daytona Beach