GREENVILLE — After canceling its summer 2020 festival season and replacing it with a series of telethons, Glow Lyric Theatre's artistic director was brought to "happy tears" thinking about starting rehearsals again.
"It's just really hard for artists because this not only is what I do for a living, but it's also what I love to do more than anything in the world," artistic director Jenna Elser said. "So, being able to get back to that is really nothing short of a miracle."
Glow's summer musical theater and opera festival is back next month with three original shows.
Eleven years ago, married couple Jenna and Christian Elser founded Glow Theatre in Greenville. The theater occasionally produces shows outside of summer, but its main focus and half of its revenue each year is made at the summer festival.
The theater's mission is to respond to what it sees as socially and politically happening in the area. Two priorities for this year's festival was to keep everyone in attendance safe and respond to "everything that we've been through collectively in the last year and a half as people," Elser said.
The Elsers thus put people — their resilience, love, passion and spirit — at the center of this festival.
For those familiar with Glow's productions, this season will reflect their Raising Voices Series, a collection of original works that discuss social justice topics.
Headlining the festival is "Rock Opera," a 90-minute, eight-person new production that combines opera, musical theater, pop and rock.
The performance will harness the "fierce emotion that is in both rock and opera music," to tell the stories of the show's actual actors as they navigate topics like the pandemic and racial justice through beat poetry, modern dance and music.
"Passione" will also be joining "Rock Opera." It is a production elevated past a traditional opera to feature love duets and arias sung by two international opera singers while interweaving their personal stories into the show.
Hugo Vera and Marina Harris, the opera's stars, are creating this show to talk about all the definitions of passion. The show will discuss love and Vera and Harris's personal passions.
It was Christian and Jenna's love for the performing arts, each other and Greenville that created Glow, Jenna said, so the final production, "The Jenna & Christian Show," will be the couple sharing anecdotes from their love story and favorite moments from Glow's history. They will also sing their favorite Broadway songs.
Glow will be implementing a COVID-19 safety plan to keep artists and audiences safe. It will be made public soon. Currently, the plan includes audience masking and limited seating to allow for social distancing.
Cast sizes will be smaller, and the season's duration has been shortened to 11 days.
"While the cast sizes may look a little smaller, it's going to look like a normal Glow season," Elser said. "It will be fully produced with sets, costumes and beautiful lighting."
The theater has paired with a mental health awareness organization, Walt's Waltz, for the 2021 season. The nonprofit will create a video series that features interviews with scholars, medical professionals and music professors discussing the intersection of the performing arts and mental health. The video series will be played in the lobby before shows. Walt's Waltz will also have a booth at the festival for those interested.
The hashtag for this season's festival is #GlowOn, which to Jenna encapsulates her feelings about the theater's reopening and how they want Glow to exist for years to come.
"I think this summer is really a celebration of reopening," she said.
The festival will run from August 19-29 at the Fred Collins Performing Arts Center at Greenville’s Kroc Center. Tickets can be bought from the theater's website and vary in price.
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July 18, 2021
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