This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Arts & Entertainment

Starring the Kid Next Door

Suwanee Academy of the Arts gets ready for a summer showcase involving local talent.

Summer is right around the corner, and with it comes Broadway in the Park, a showcase of young artists from the community that will be catapulted to local stardom. Auditions were recently held for this year’s productions, “Hairspray" and "Rapunzel’s Twist."

The Broadway in the Park series began in 2007 and has been delighting audiences each year with spectacular performances such as “Beauty and the Beast,” “High School Musical” and most recently “Footloose.”

Performances are presented at the amphitheater at Town Center Park in Suwanee on July 29-30. The series came about because of the need for somewhere large enough to accommodate the shows and large audiences.

Find out what's happening in Suwaneewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Berneta Davis (Ms. Bernie), artistic Director for SAA, said, “We needed a big venue and there’s no theater (in Suwanee). We needed somewhere to perform.”

When asked how the shows have been received by the community, Davis stated, “The response has been huge. Everybody loves (the shows) and comes to see them.”

Find out what's happening in Suwaneewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

This year’s productions of “Hairspray” and “Rapunzel’s Twist” will be poignantly delivering the message of acceptance for who you are inside, not what you look like on the outside, and it is a tremendous message for our time.

After inquiries from the community as to why the shows are not “free,” this year there will be a radical change. For the first time ever, no admission will be charged. Partnering with the City of Suwanee, corporate sponsors and patron sponsors, Suwanee Performing Arts is hopeful that tremendous support from the community will be more than enough to meet and exceed the costs incurred to put on a performance of this magnitude.

 A 50/50 raffle will be held, and concessions and activities will be offered to further help defray production costs.

Anyone interested in a corporate sponsorship should contact Marianne Weyen, corporate sponsor coordinator, at 770-329-8400.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?

More from Suwanee