BONNIE McPeak was a bit nervous about dancing on Newcastle’s Civic Theatre stage wearing a 1.5-metre-long mermaid’s tail on Tuesday, but the audience applause at the end of her number showed her concern was not justified.
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Bonnie, 13, is playing the lead role in The Little Mermaid Jr, a stage adaptation of a Disney film musical that will have its Australian premiere in Newcastle.
Newcastle youth theatre group Hunter Region Drama School will present the show at the Civic Theatre for four performances between October 9 and 11.
The company’s head and director of the production, Daniel Stoddart, said at Tuesday's official launch that 1200 tickets had already been pre-sold.
And he revealed that as well as winning the rights for the first staging of the show in this country, the drama school had become the first Australian company to be invited to perform at the annual Junior Theatre Festival held in the United States city Atlanta.
The 50 cast members will go to the US in January to perform excerpts from The Little Mermaid Jr at the three-day festival.
They will also get a sneak peak at junior versions of two other musicals being released next year, The Lion King and James and the Giant Peach.
Daniel Stoddart said the cast would do theatre workshops at New York’s famed Juilliard dance, drama and musical school and Hollywood movie auditions.
At Tuesday's launch, Bonnie McPeak sang Part of Your World, in which her undersea princess, Ariel, expresses her hope of being able to go on to dry land to be with a prince she has fallen in love with.
Bonnie, 13, said that while she had tried the mermaid costume on many times while it was being made by the wardrobe team – Jennifer Ellicott and Kerrie Fischer – Tuesday was the first time while performing.
