Jennifer & Jason Paquette deserve a standing ovation

Couple retiring CAST after more than 20 years in Woodstock youth theatre

Past performers / alumni are staging Into The Woods this weekend 

By Mark Schadenberg

An exceptional way to pay tribute to a teacher is to deftly display the skills taught – for the students to combine their efforts into a performance of thanks.

This would be the case in any sport or perhaps a young violinist winning a recital.

In Woodstock, a CAST encore will be this weekend’s production of Into The Woods at Theatre Woodstock.

For more than 20 years the Reeve Street stage has been home to CAST (young people Creating And Staging Theatre). The youth local troupe has been led by Jennifer and Jason Paquette, who recently announced they would be retiring, and therefore officially handing reins over to Theatre Woodstock, its general manager Mike Crabbe and other volunteers.

CAST alumni decided to congregate for one final show -- create a sendoff production of adoration and adulation for Mr & Mrs Paquette, and the group selected the Stephen Sondheim musical (James Lapine story) Into The Woods as its subject.
Stephen Sondheim resume 

Sondheim has a very significant library of shows - Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum, Bounce, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, West Side Story and Company. 

Into The Woods is a good choice as it combines children’s fictional tales into a show geared for adults. The premise of the storyline includes Jack & The Beanstalk, Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, and Cinderella. Therefore, there is a boy trading a cow for magic beans, the subsequent giant, a big bad wolf, a baker, a young girl with a cape, a witch, a prince, Sleeping Beauty, and other characters to weave a storyline which includes songs such as Your Fault, It Takes Two, I Know Things Now, No One Is Alone, First Midnight, and Children Will Listen. My personal favourite is Your Fault as everyone is to blame and certainly can be blamed to some degree, but all deflect that fault to someone else in a witty tune.  

The selection of Into The Woods seems quite ‘logical’ as in the Star Trek episode where Spock noted it would be interesting to see what will have grown 20 years later from the seeds sown today when referring to the emerging power of the character Khan. I digress, but 20 years later the movie Wrath Of Khan was a huge success.

Costumes, music, stage cues, memorizing lines and lyrics, rising curtains, volunteering parents, time commitments, posters and publicity, and dancing and acting for more than 20 years has created an astounding group of alumni to perform this weekend (today to August 27, and the shows are sold out).

CAST not only staged two productions annually starring the teenagers up to 19 years old as a ‘senior group’ show, but they also created shows to be performed by younger age brackets – as young as 7 years old in a ‘junior group’. When you factor in the summer camp shows, CAST has produced more than 100 different plays or musicals.

Three of the Paquette family members will star in the Sondheim show – Kaitland, Emily and Jacob.

My kids just completed the Woodstock Theatre (519 537-2582) kids summer camp and its staging of Little Mermaid Junior, so many of those instructors are CAST grads and some of the same theatre producers will be on stage for Into The Woods, including Jacob Paquette, Victoria Thompson and Mike Crabbe.

The Woodstock Sentinel-Review has featured other former CAST members in a series, which is also a tribute to the Paquette family’s efforts. The newspaper series notes that Into The Woods is among the many shows performed previously by CAST. The S-R stories also gave CAST members an opportunity to publicly thank the Paquette couple for their years of devotion to youth and theatre.

I’ve always been a person who believes youth must find their passion – whether it is singing, acting, sports, dance, scouting or other endeavours. Jen and Jason supplied the destination for inspiring stage performers and for those who also wanted to work behind the scenes as well.
Extra Large With Milk & Sweetner please

Besides donating their skills and dedication to youth theatre, Jason and Jen are also local philanthropists as owners of two Tim Hortons stores. The pair have provided coffee and snacks to dozens of events annually (free or at an extremely reduced price) for many years, and are always a top sponsor of the Terry Fox Run. Jason Paquette has even been known to camp out on the roof of their store to raise dollars for the Tim Hortons’ youth camps at Camp Day.

Theatre Woodstock 2016-17 Season flyer

The CAST alumni also includes Daniel VanWinden, Teale Poirier, Ben Alexander, Hayley Matheson, Zane O’Connor, Taylor Markham-Tamachi, Mike Schryver, Cole Hill, Laurence Marshall and Chloe Weir. For the show’s rehearsals, many of these actors have travelled from distances outside of Woodstock to make this show possible.

Matheson, for example, is attending Ryerson this fall to continue studies in theatrical performances. In The S-R series, Matheson, who is from Embro, talked about returning to Woodstock to perform as Rapunzel in Into The Woods, saying: “I’m not working with just anyone. I’m working with the people that inspired me to do what I do,”

Since there is a witch in Into The Woods, you could say that Jen and Jason Paquette CAST a spell on the youth of this area to love and admire theatre – acting, singing and dance. You could add, that in turn, the youth nurtured the Paquette family’s love for the stage as they continued their efforts for more than 20 years, and that includes adult productions from Theatre Woodstock as Jen was director of Tuesdays With Morrie a few years ago and many many other shows. In that show, Jason played the role of Mitch.

To continue the connections, Jason and son Jacob starred in A Soldier’s Heart by David French back in 2013, which would have been a rewarding moment for both as Jacob was named after the character Jacob Mercer from both Salt-Water Moon and A Soldier’s Heart. Jason and Jen met while staging Salt-Water Moon in the early 1990’s (Archives of theatre say 1991-92 season). The family’s long-time friendship with Woodstock’s Bennett family (Edwin and Lee) strengthens that bind as Ed Bennett, who passed away in 2010, had been a prisoner of war in the Second World War.     

Jason and Jennifer Paquette in 2013 
during staging of play A Soldier's Heart.

Back right is their son Jacob who is the Big Bad Wolf in Into The Woods

 this weekend at Theatre Woodstock -- the CAST farewell alumni shows
(Photo is from The Sentinel-Review archives online)

Theatre and the Paquette family are very important to Woodstock, so you can add me to the people announcing from my lower diaphragm so folks in the last row can hear: “Thanks for sharing your wisdom and skills, and thanks for your dedication to the youth of Woodstock.”   

I also personally know that the Paquette family gained some of their admiration for Theatre Woodstock through the late (and legendary) Lee and Ed Bennett. My connections to Ed Bennett was through both the Woodstock sports wall of fame and 'Klondike Joe' Boyle.

Theatre Community

Woodstock is actually quite lucky to have such a strong group of theatre people – from Lee Bennett, to Edythe Smith, Brian George, Rosemary George, Bonnie Hartley, Mark Tonner, Joanna Sweete, Jeff Sweete, Sally Johnston, Andrew Norris, Tony Harding, Don Hastie, Natalie Surridge, Mary Holmes, Dan Grass, Dave Butcher . . . .   

I believe 2016 also marks 20 years since Theatre Woodstock moved into the former farm market building on Reeve Street (from the badminton club on Hunter Street). It’s a great location for stage theatre as it’s across the street from both City Hall and the Oxford administration building, but it’s also a short walk to countless restaurants, the museum, and art gallery. 

The association’s website, by the way, has an archived listing of productions dating back to 1946, and many won regional drama league awards.

LINKS:

www.theatrewoodstock.com

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2016/02/03/jen-and-jason-paquette-are-retiring-after-two-decades-of-running-woodstocks-youth-theatre-company

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2016/07/15/cast-grads-from-past-two-decades-return-to-woodstock-for-alumni-performance-of-into-the-woods

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2016/08/23/graduates-of-cast-youth-theatre-program-many-pursuing-music-and-theatre-reunite-for-alumni-show

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2016/08/08/two-cast-grads-fell-in-love-and-got-engaged-onstage-years-after-they-first-met-at-theatre-camp

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2016/07/28/recent-cast-grads-find-success-in-the-performing-arts-as-they-begin-their-careers

http://www.lfpress.com/2013/01/31/life-imitates-art-in-theatre-woodstock-production-of-soldiers-heart

http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/2010/11/16/tell-them-im-a-good-guy

This picture was posted today on Facebook by Paul Roberts,

so I thought I should include it here.

Woodstock farm market under construction in 1895.

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Discussion . . . Direction . . . Determination . . . Destination

Little Mermaid cast for Theatre Woodstock's

summer camp included my two great kids