Sam Lanier ’26 – Stage Manager
On the show:
“I think that show is about the unattractive elements of this group synthesis. None of those people’s stories really inspire empathy in a real, real way. The ballet people are a little self-centered because they’re so focused on beauty. And Val’s story is so centered on superficiality. But when you bring them together, they become this story of wanting to be seen. Even Cassie’s story – she leaves, she doesn’t communicate, she’s uncommunicative with somebody who otherwise loves her. And there’s so many ugly things that together become pretty…When I first read the script, I was like, ‘oh, so they’re just totally flipping the coin.’ So, they’re starting by saying, ‘This is a little ugly,’ and then eventually, all of these people really are pretty. They’re nice, good people who want reasonable things. But it’s not – that’s not the conclusion. The conclusion is that together, they are meaningful, that as a group, they prop up something greater…[that even that closing number], they’re supposed to be a person that they’re embodying, that they’re representing, but they’re that person is absent. So, what does that mean? What are you supposed to take away from that? It’s that they are the thing. Together, they create this synthesis. It’s not just Chorus Line. It’s A Chorus Line. It’s random chance that brought these people together, that together convince you of this story of individual discord that puts together this beautiful thing about meaningfulness.
“And as a person, I’m not really into like wanting to be looked at – I think it’s a little self-centered – but just seeing all these different people have different reasons for it – because it’s all a little bit about wanting to be cool, wanting to be pretty, wanting to be loved, or whatever it is – but all of them average out to this like…they’re not vindictive, they’re not petty, and they’re not mean. They’re just desirous of a better situation for themselves with the cards that they’ve been dealt. And honestly, I think particularly Val’s story has to be ugly. It has to be yucky and make you feel a little bit…in Latin 4 right now, I’m reading Ovid, and it’s…Daphne and Apollo, that story – it’s yucky. It makes you feel disgusting, and it should, because it’s about this objectification, and it’s about reclaiming that narrative, and it should feel ugly because it is ugly. It’s turning that mirror around and letting you say, ‘Why am I doing this?’ Why would she feel the need to do this? And it should sound yucky, because that’s her [character’s] goal. It’s to make you feel yucky, and it’s so important that we feel that way. It’s so important that we feel that way.”
On the takeaways:
“Modern media – it’s like, ‘Oh, well this thing is cool on its own.” Take your Alice in Wonderland, for example. Sure, there are things surrounding Alice, but they’re all kind of there to prop up her narrative. And then then there’s stories about duality. Have you ever heard of Eternity? This new movie where one girl dies, and her husband that she had when she was young and the husband that she died with, she gets to pick which one to spend [eternity] with. They’re both propping up this core thing, so it’s either comes in threes or twos or ones, but this show is so chaotic – not everyone gets equivalent amounts of screen time, and when they do get screen time, sometimes it doesn’t even feel like they told their whole story. But you get these little snippets that create this weird synthesis, where people together are better. And it’s not like this story of a team that builds together. It’s not even that they’re trying to work together. It’s that they’re working on being their best selves and together, they are better than they are on their own. So, I think it’s an intensely real piece of art.
“The way that the writer of this musical, that he wrote it was by interviewing a bunch of people and stealing their stories under the false guise that they were going to be cast in this show and make money, and then some of them didn’t – not very nice of him. But it’s real. It’s intensely real. And the fact that that reality, when you look at it, can come away with something meaningful…the last lyric of the show is ‘she’s the one?’ but there’s a question mark at the end, and that’s the way that it’s delivered. It’s confusing. It’s not supposed to be this sonorous symphony. It’s supposed to be cacophonous. And to be honest, it’s…you know Antigone? It’s the duality. Creon and Antigone are fighting over whether her brother should deserve a proper burial. And there’s so many pieces of media where you got to pick a side, right? That’s the way this world is sometimes, we try and create this duality, this left- and right-leaning, but realizing that the life that we live is so messy and still…the average person gets something out of Chorus Line – that together we’re pretty, together we build something greater than ourselves and we contribute to something that none of us individually are. But I don’t know. I’ve seen this show maybe fifty times, and I’ve gotten a little bit of a different message out of it based on what I paid attention to. So, if you pay more attention to Paul [Aiden Mangalick, Bellarmine ’26] and Cassie, you’ll get something different than if you pay attention to Diana [played by Saidee Avila, Oakwood HS ’28] and Don [played by Leo Chernyakhovskiy ’26]. They all have their stories to tell, and it’s not…it is not pretty.”
Joshua Cayanes ’27 – Assistant Stage Manager
On the show:
“I like the show. I think that it has a good message to tell about ‘all of us are unique and special’, and the individualistic [theme] and how that applies. And then I think that also, along with that, I think that the scenes about – especially brought up during the montage scenes – a lot of it’s about them growing up and going into their adolescence and I think that’s really important, especially with the audience we have here, which, like, not just adults coming in, but also mostly students from other schools, from Bell. So, I think it’s a good representation about common feelings that teenagers and people growing up have.”
On the takeaways:
“The thing is it’s mostly about being yourself, and how everyone’s special, especially with the ending – even though Zach [played by Henry Larson, Bellarmine ’26] only cast the eight or whatever people, they all come back in. They all equally could have been chosen because they’re all special. Well, I guess technically that’s not true. Not all of them had a chance, but even so, they’re all a bit special in order to be recognized. I like those scenes about individualism – or not individualism really – just like the importance about sharing yourself and being who you are.”
From struggles of gender and sexuality to the identities of who we are opposed to who we pretend to be and want to be, the ugly truths and beautiful lies of the showbusiness, A Chorus Line ultimately tells a story that’s rich and deeply pensive (yet uncomfortable), intertwined with life’s challenges that have and continue to shape us every day.
We are reminded of the ways we build ourselves and each other up, a single point in the vast sea existence, and yet, a very important point in the face of a world that can tear things down.