Theatre Palisades Youth will perform this spring, despite Pierson Playhouse burning to the ground.
Theatre Palisades Youth (TPY) includes aspiring singers and performers from ages 8 to 14. The young thespians generally perform twice a year, and despite the Palisades Fire and the loss of the theater (Pierson Playhouse), the spring show Crazy for You is now in rehearsals.
Long-time TPY Director Lara Ganz wrote in an email to CTN that St. Monica hosted their first rehearsal of Crazy, through choreographer Rebecca Barragan’s connections.
“We are getting some offers of rehearsal spaces and are still looking for a stage for Crazy for You, with some possible options being forwarded to us,” Ganz said. She is also directing Beetlejuice, Revere Middle School’s spring musical. That show will continue its rehearsals in the school space, because the school was unharmed by the fire.
Ganz told Circling the News that one of the Theatre Palisades teens, Vanessa Masterson, who attends Palisades High School and whose home was also lost in the fire, set up a go-fund me page to rebuild the Pierson Playhouse. That Playhouse was the site of not only TPY productions, but also the community theater productions, which has five show a year.
Ganz said that Masterson is only 15 but has helped the younger kids in rehearsals as well. “She is so generous, capable, talented, and exhibits the BRIGHTEST spirit of service,” Ganz said. “We are so unbelievably fortunate because of her involvement in our community.” For the playhouse rebuild link click here.
Parent Lisa Sweetingham, whose 12-year-old daughter Natalie is a TPY regular and singer, told CTN that “many TPY families including Lara and John Ganz have lost their homes, but they have moved heaven and earth to keep the kids on a rehearsal schedule, borrowing space at St. Monica’s auditorium and vowing ‘the show must go on.’”
Ganz said, “We just knew that we have to keep engaging the kids with purpose and MUSIC. . .the most healing medium on the planet. They need that right now.
“We must keep the kids close together and singing,” she said. “Many Palisades parents are clear that we can’t let our kids fall into deep isolation as they did during Covid, and we are determined to unite them in passion and purpose.
“We have so many what if’s,” Ganz said. “All we have left is our energy and what we can give to each other in terms of kindness, care, support, love, light and common understanding.”
The theater building, Pierson playhouse, is gone, the costumes reduced to ashes and the sets only a memory.
Sweetingham said, “We’ve all lost so much and for our kids to see the resilience of our collective TPY family- to see we don’t quit – that is what the Palisades spirit is all about.”
Wonderfully inspiring and definitely on the right track.
In light of all the trauma, physically, spiritually, emotionally, I appreciated Ganz’s comment, ‘ All we have is energy and what we can give to each other in terms of kindness, care, support, love, light and common understanding.’ Bitterness and blame will not fix things – only hinder moving forward. My prayers and thoughts are with all effected, including families of the effected.
There is a stage at Rustic Canyon Park they could practice at.