So just how hard will it be for “Frozen” performers and those who worked so hard on this longest-running Paramount Theatre production to “Let it Go” after Sunday evening’s final show?
Theater folks tell me it’s always tough to say good-bye when that last curtain drops, but this one is particularly hard for cast and crew, including the director of the popular Disney musical that ran for 12 weeks in downtown Aurora and reached an audience of over 110,000.
Trent Stork, who is also artistic producer and casting director for the Paramount, was already getting sentimental when we spoke on Thursday.
“I’m tearing up just thinking about it,” the “Frozen” director confessed, noting that the show’s final song is its well-known anthem. “There will be crying onstage. It’s just a special show and full of special human beings from top to bottom … it really will be hard to let it go.”
Stork, who began working on “Frozen” in September of 2023, tells me the separation process really began on opening night, when the director had to turn to the Paramount’s next production, “Waitress.”
“It’s hard to transition,” said Stork, adding that “you can go through show withdrawal” because of the time and emotion that goes into such a major production.
When cast and crew go through that many holidays together – Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s – with little but a day off, strong relationships are formed. For example: Emily Kristen Morris, who plays Elsa, and Beth Stafford Laird, who is Anna, made Aurora their home for three months until “one day it’s all over and they fly back to New York on Monday,” Stork pointed out.
“It’s crazy how it happens … they get settled in, make lifelong friends and then it’s like ‘see ya,’” Stork said.
For the director, the “real joy” is watching performers blossom and to realize how extensive their talents truly are. Stork points specifically to Joliet native and now Shorewood resident Shelbi Voss, who played the lead of Molly Aster in Copley Theatre’s BOLD Series production, “Peter and the Starcatcher,” and was a member of the “Frozen” ensemble.
Not only did the 26-year-old actor’s dancing, puppeteering and comedic timing shine through, Stork noted, Voss also was the understudy for the role of Anna, and on a half-dozen occasions was told “that morning she was going on” as the lead.
Being a swing or understudy “takes a lot of extra hours … running the show myself in my bedroom,” admitted Voss, whose Paramount debut was in “Kinky Boots” in 2021, a couple months after graduating from college (with a degree in journalism, no less).
Putting so many long hours into this show, she said, means parting will indeed be bittersweet.
“When you are so engrained nine times a week for 12 weeks, how can it not feel weird when the routine is suddenly gone?” Voss asked.
Plus, seeing so many families in the audiences or watching a child’s face light up from this magical holiday show, she added, makes even more unforgettable memories.
For Kevin Curiel-Berls, vice president of patron services, what stands out to him from “Frozen” is “the sheer volume of new people” who came to the Aurora theater. Over 110,000 will have seen the musical – tickets are still available, by the way – with an impressive 26% being first-time Paramount patrons.
A few more fun stats he provided: There were over 17,000 cookies consumed at concessions, and over 2,500 plush toys found new homes with audience members.
The fact this show brought in so many new people can’t be understated, said Curiel-Berls, who found in the post-show polls he conducts those first-timers definitely plan a return trip to the theater.
And no wonder. Even the staff, he said, took note of the “warm and fuzzy feeling” they got from seeing the faces of so many people – especially young ones, many dressed in “Frozen” attire – light up at the sheer magic this show offered.
“It has brought our company together, too,” said Curiel-Berls who, like Stork, has been at the Paramount for nearly a dozen years.
“It feels like we are back to normal” since pre-pandemic, said Curiel-Berls. “And that’s really a good feeling.”
No doubt those good feelings extend to the cast and crew, as well. Just because the show is closing, Voss told me, “we are not letting each other go … we are moving forward, but taking some awesome people and memories with us at the same time.”
In the meantime, there will be “a lot of heart left on that stage,” she added, referring to the final chorus the entire cast sings “directly to the audience” in the show’s final moments.
It’s as if “they are stepping out of the ‘Frozen’ world,” she said, “and telling everyone to let their personal, their worldly concerns go.”
dcrosby@tribpub.com
