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Alumni Reunite to Elevate Delone Catholic’s Theatre Program: A Tale of Friendship, Talent, and Faith
By Valerie Lippe P’25
“I’m really looking for volume and articulation,” exhorts Gabi Cranga ‘17, Delone Catholic’s Theatre Director, to a group of students sitting in a ragged row across the edge of the stage in the Delone Gymnasium. Two lights, to their left and right, illuminate the group in this otherwise dark, cavernous room. As they listen, the students lean towards each other with an easy familiarity. Their legs, dangling over the side, unconsciously begin to swing in unison. They have spent weeks practicing together, and now, at the conclusion of the Saturday night rehearsal, they have reached what might be called the calm before the storm. Tomorrow marks the beginning of “tech week,” those physically and emotionally demanding days that will lead up to the performance of Aladdin, Jr.
“You make friends during rehearsals, you make family during tech week,” observes Marilyn Lopes, ‘15. She and three other Delone Catholic alumni, Joel Reiner ‘17, Joseph Staub ‘16, and Elizabeth (Rink) Reiner ‘18, have been invited by Ms. Cranga to assist in the production of this classic Disney musical. Like the four Pevensie children in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series, who first enter Narnia as naive and untested children and return to that magical land, when needed, as kings and queens, the four alumni return to their high school as polished and confident adults responding without hesitation to Ms. Cranga’s request for help. The five alumni forged their friendship during many rehearsals and tech weeks of the theatre program at Delone Catholic, learning to trust each other under stress.
“We have all the pieces now,” says Ms. Cranga. Tonight’s piece is microphones. “We just need to put it together.” As if on cue, a voice booms out from the loudspeaker, “Well, five seems to be working,” and seconds later, “I think I got it.”
Though there is still much to be done, Ms. Cranga remains remarkably collected. “‘Trust the process,’ is what I always tell myself.” It is not only a commitment to this time-tested theatre adage that keeps her balanced. “I’ve been praying for a while, ‘Please God, take this show, it is in your control,’” she says. For Ms. Cranga, theatre is a way to share her faith. “When I acted, I would ask God what message He wanted my character to relay to the audience.” Now, as a director, she tries to choose shows that, even if secular, convey spiritual truths. She chose Aladdin Jr. because its core messages were, “Be yourself” and “It is not what is on the outside, but what is on the inside that counts.”
Over the course of this production, she has enjoyed watching her students gain the confidence to be themselves and share their God-given talents. “They are letting their light shine,” she says. As much as developing acting skills, she wants her students to learn technical, problem-solving, and leadership skills. She also wants them to thrive socially and emotionally. “For a lot of kids, this is their place,” she notes. She consciously tries to make it a place of positivity. “I am more impressed by just how comfortable they are with each other during these rehearsals,” she says. “That is more important than putting on a dazzling and glittery show that makes the audience go, ‘wow.’ What is important to me is that our students are finding friend groups, a place to belong, and a way to express themselves with confidence. That is what I see happening, and that’s what happened for me.”
While Ms. Cranga already had an impressive performing arts resume when she entered Delone Catholic, including involvement in community theatre, serving as cantor in her parish church, and starring in her middle school’s production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, she was a bit apprehensive about starting high school. “I was nervous about where I would fit in,” she says. She made her best friend in her first play at Delone Catholic. “She hated me when we first met in Spanish class,” admits Ms. Cranga, “but, in that first show, we bonded instantly.”
The four alumni, who have now become her partners in this production, have similar stories about the transformative effects of participating in the performing arts at Delone Catholic.
Elizabeth Reiner, Costume and Music director for Aladdin Jr., became involved in the performing arts through the music program. Although she loved musicals, she did not have the confidence to try out her freshman year. She built that confidence through the chorus and the school’s instrumental program, where she played the clarinet, bass clarinet, saxophone, and trumpet. By her junior year, feeling ready to try out, she garnered one of the leading roles in the musical, The Little Mermaid.
Reflecting on her involvement in the musical, she notes, “I definitely think it made me a more confident person. I was more willing to push myself.” She was one of a small group of students from Delone Catholic chosen to represent the school in the Adams County Chorus, a concert made up of selected students from each of the Adams County schools. “I never would have tried out for that had I not felt confident through my experience in the musical,” she notes. She has carried that confidence into adulthood, now singing in her parish church choir.
Like Ms. Cranga, she connects her involvement in the performing arts to her faith. “I think it was St. Augustine who said, ‘when you sing you pray twice,’” says Mrs. Reiner. “Even if it is singing in a secular play, I feel like you are paying homage to God by showing everyone what He gave you.”
Mrs. Reiner also found lasting friendships from the Delone Catholic theatre program, the most important of which is her husband, Joel Reiner, Tech Director and Rehearsal Accompanist for Aladdin Jr., whom she started dating during the production of The Little Mermaid. Like his wife, Mr. Reiner found his way into the performing arts at Delone Catholic through the music program, including marching band, jazz band, chorus, and the musicals’ pit orchestra.
His only foray into acting happened by accident. The play was A Christmas Carol. “I came a little too early for practice,” he says. “I wanted to do tech, but somebody didn’t show up.” So the director asked him to fill in for the role of Scrooge’s nephew. Although this was his only stage performance, he was involved in tech for almost every theatrical production while at Delone Catholic, doing lighting and stage crew. “I went into high school not knowing a lot of people,” he says, “and I think getting myself involved in the music program and also in theatre, I met a lot of great friends.”
Responding to invitations was how Joseph Staub, Tech Director for Aladdin Jr., became involved in theatre at Delone Catholic. He joined crew for the spring musical his freshman year after his homeroom teacher asked for volunteers. While he continued in tech for the following fall production, the director of the play, who also had a stage role, would ask Mr. Staub to read his lines for him while he took care of other responsibilities. Seeing the budding actor in Mr. Staub, the director encouraged him to try out for the spring show. He did, and ended up acting in every other show during his remaining two and a half years at Delone Catholic.
“It definitely made me more confident and gave me the ability to gain leadership roles,” says Mr. Staub about that time. “By my senior year, I was one of the people that the director would trust to keep things going while he was off doing other things.” He also credits the experience with allowing him to branch out socially. Like many in theatre, he was involved in band and speech and debate. “It was really great to develop a close-knit, friend group with people who were involved in all those different activities.”
Like Ms. Cranga, Marilyn Lopes, Choreographer and Vocal Coach for Aladdin Jr., came to Delone Catholic with quite a bit of theatrical experience, including performing in a local theatre production at age nine with Dr. Maureen Thiec, who at that time was Delone Catholic’s principal. Surprisingly, Ms. Lopes admits to having been very introverted. “But if you get me into an environment in which I think I can thrive, I am ready.” She was involved in every show while at Delone Catholic, with leading roles in the two musicals.
Reflecting on how her theatre experience at Delone Catholic impacted her, she says, “I think it solidified that theatre was forever going to be a part of my life.” It led to her decision to get her Bachelor of Arts in musical theatre, which opened up opportunities, including working as a costume designer in a production at the Kennedy Center. “And now it’s wonderful to be back in the space that gave me the confidence to want to do it,” she says, “and pass that along to another generation.”
And, like many of Delone Catholic’s alumni, they have much to pass along. “Because of the different paths we’ve walked, different experiences we’ve had, we all can pull from different avenues,” says Ms. Lopes. They have brought not only their talents in staging a theatrical production but also a network of community contacts from which the production has benefitted, such as costumes from the Gettysburg Community Theater and two spotlights from the Eichelberger Performing Arts Center.
The four alumni volunteers encourage other alums to give their time to the school. “For any alumni who would want to be involved in something like this,” says Mr. Staub, “I think it’s a really rewarding experience.” They each remember the needs the school had when, as students, they did not have the resources to respond. To alumni, Ms. Reiner would say, “Now, if you see a need, you can be the one that can fix it.”
