{"id":117222,"date":"2023-03-29T21:35:49","date_gmt":"2023-03-30T01:35:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=117222"},"modified":"2023-03-29T21:36:44","modified_gmt":"2023-03-30T01:36:44","slug":"local-girls-at-muhlenberg-theatre-dance-april-20-23","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=117222","title":{"rendered":"‘Local Girls’ at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance, April 20-23"},"content":{"rendered":"

Love Is Loud
\n<\/b><\/span>News ImageTeenage metal band longs for love and triumph in \u2018Local Girls,\u2019 April 20-23 at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance
\n<\/i><\/span>
\nAllentown, Pa. (March 29, 2023) \u2014 Anyone who has ever felt stuck in their circumstances, dreaming of escape, will find familiar themes in Emma Goidel\u2019s “Local Girls,” says Beth Schachter, who will direct the play for Muhlenberg College\u2019s Theatre & Dance Department, April 20-23.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe show calls attention to the limits and constraints on people in their late teens, heading out into life,\u201d says Schachter, a professor of theater at Muhlenberg. \u201cIt also exlores the importance of sticking with relationships where you love somebody, even if that person fails you or you fail them.\u201d<\/p>\n

A play with music about searching for big-time glory in a small town, Goidel\u2019s 2016 “Local Girls” depicts very real characters in a lively and comic way, Schachter says. Diskit is a high school chemistry genius in need of friends; Riley is a high school burnout in need of a screamer for her metal band. A local contest could transform these two high school girls from losers to rock gods. But will it be enough to get them out of Tucker, Georgia?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe show highlights the feeling of being passionate about something,\u201d says musical director and composer Jeff Yorgey. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of metal out there that has a positive message \u2014 and not a lot of people realize that. Heavy metal is an outlet when there\u2019s no way to get certain feelings out other than shouting them at the top of your lungs.\u201d<\/p>\n

All of the cast members have a musical background, but most of them wouldn\u2019t have described themselves as metal-heads. So Yorgey has been working closely with them since January, helping them learn how to play and sing like rock stars and transform themselves into Thigh Trap, the band at the heart of Local Girls.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to believe that these characters are lifelong metal musicians,\u201d says Yorgey, \u201cSo it\u2019s been my main challenge to get the actors up to speed on how these instruments are played in the frame of metal music.\u201d<\/p>\n

The cast says that actually playing their instruments has benefited their character development in more ways than one.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving live music honestly makes the process more comfortable,\u201d says Christine Norton, who plays Riley. \u201cTo have my instrument with me when I\u2019m on stage helps me make a deeper connection with my character \u2014 and it’s fun! I think that\u2019s what the show is all about: finding a way to describe what the feeling of music brings to people and what exactly makes them feel that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The show features a cast of just six actors, including an understudy and a guest performance by acting professor Jim Van Valen as Diskit\u2019s dad. Tomomi Lewis-Noguchi, who plays Diskit, says that discovering the intimate relationships among the characters has been a crucial element of the rehearsal process.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of the characters have been friends, or are just becoming friends,\u201d Lewis-Noguchi says. \u201cSo we\u2019ve needed to develop these relationships in order to portray them realistically.\u201d Schachter agrees.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can really benefitting from this intense imaginative piece,\u201d she says. \u201cEveryone is contributing in rehearsal and the actors are like adventurers \u2014 they keep making discoveries about how their characters care for each other.”<\/p>\n

Schachter says she was drawn to \u201cLocal Girls\u201d by its authentic depiction of teenage life \u2014 the struggle for love and belonging. The actors agree, and say they\u2019ve been delving into their own fairly recent teenage experiences as they formulate their characters \u2014 angst, hard-hitting drama, close friendships, and confusion.<\/p>\n

\u201cExpect to be taken back to high school \u2014 in good and bad ways,\u201d Lewis-Noguchi says. \u201cThe show calls attention to that feeling of not knowing anything about yourself, and then learning things about yourself from the people you love.\u201d<\/p>\n

Local Girls runs April 20-23: Thursday at 8 p.m., Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m. Performances are in the Studio Theatre, in Muhlenberg\u2019s Trexler Pavilion for Theatre & Dance, Muhlenberg College. The production includes adult language and themes. Tickets are $15 regular admission; $8 for youth tickets, and $8 for LVAIC students, faculty and staff. Tickets are available online at\u00a0muhlenberg.edu\/seeashow<\/a>\u00a0or by phone at 484-664-3333.
\n<\/b><\/p>\n

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About the Muhlenberg College Theatre & Dance Department
\n<\/b>Muhlenberg offers Bachelor of Arts degrees in theatre and dance. The Princeton Review ranked Muhlenberg\u2019s theatre program in the top twelve in the nation for eight years in a row, and Fiske Guide to Colleges lists both the theatre and dance programs among the top small college programs in the United States. Muhlenberg is one of only eight colleges to be listed in Fiske for both theatre and dance.<\/p>\n

About Muhlenberg College
\n<\/b>Founded in 1848, Muhlenberg is a highly selective, private, four-year residential, liberal arts college offering baccalaureate and graduate programs. With an enrollment of approximately 2,200 students, Muhlenberg College is dedicated to shaping creative, compassionate, collaborative leaders through rigorous academic programs in the arts, humanities, natural sciences and social sciences; selected preprofessional programs, including accounting, business, education and public health; and progressive workforce-focused post-baccalaureate certificates and master\u2019s degrees. Located in Allentown, Pennsylvania, approximately 90 miles west of New York City, Muhlenberg is a member of the Centennial Conference, competing in 22 varsity sports. Muhlenberg is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Information Provided By:
\nScott Snyder
\nMarketing Manager
\nMuhlenberg College Department of Theatre & Dance<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Love Is Loud News ImageTeenage metal band longs for love and triumph in \u2018Local Girls,\u2019 April 20-23 at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance Allentown, Pa. (March 29, 2023) \u2014 Anyone who … Continue reading ‘Local Girls’ at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance, April 20-23<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108438,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5716,69,482],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-allentown","category-in-the-valley","category-press-release-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/muhl-college.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117222"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=117222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/108438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=117222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=117222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=117222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}