"This is mu­si­cal the­atre with el­e­ments of com­e­dy, dra­ma, dance," said Trevor Jug­mo­han, pro­duc­er of the up­com­ing pro­duc­tion The King and I. "Not on­ly is this a grand mu­si­cal, but it set a bench­mark for all mu­si­cals that have been staged on Broad­way."

In an in­ter­view with Jug­mo­han in late March, the Sun­day Arts Sec­tion got an ex­clu­sive be­hind-the-scenes look at this mu­si­cal project.

The King and I is de­rived from Mar­garet Lan­don's nov­el An­na and the King of Siam. It is the fifth mu­si­cal by the team of com­pos­er Richard Rodgers and drama­tist Os­car Ham­mer­stein II and was lat­er adapt­ed to the 1956 film ver­sion, for which lead ac­tor Yul Bryn­ner (The King) won the Best Ac­tor Os­car.

Jug­mo­han's com­pa­ny is called First In­stinct; it was found­ed in 2009 and last year staged The Sound of Mu­sic, an­oth­er beloved Rodgers and Ham­mer­stein mu­si­cal.

"Af­ter the Sound of Mu­sic in 2012, First In­stinct was in­tent on build­ing a rep­u­ta­tion for qual­i­ty the­atre in T&T and, more so, qual­i­ty fam­i­ly en­ter­tain­ment. The King and I was the choice of our ex­ec­u­tive pro­duc­er, John Smith, who in­tend­ed to raise the bar even high­er than the one set with our pre­vi­ous pro­duc­tion."

Jug­mo­han said the cast­ing process in­cor­po­rat­ed ac­tors who had been with the com­pa­ny in the Sound of Mu­sic, along with those gleaned from an open cast­ing call ad­ver­tised in the dai­ly news­pa­pers as well as on Face­book.com. "The qual­i­ty of young, tal­ent­ed, vi­brant per­form­ers was over­whelm­ing. It was a hard de­ci­sion to at­tempt to place all wor­thy par­tic­i­pants. So hard, in fact, we dou­ble-cast and placed un­der­stud­ies un­der sev­er­al char­ac­ters, thus ac­com­mo­dat­ing the best of the best."

The play­ers in­clude lead ac­tor Con­rad Par­ris as the King of Siam; To­va Miller as An­na Leonowens; and Ger­maine Wil­son and Pat­ti-Anne Ali shar­ing the role of La­dy Thi­ang, the King's chief wife. The sup­port­ing cast in­cludes Chris Smith as Krala­home and Rais Clarke-Mendes as the King's newest wife Tup Tim. Her se­cret love in­ter­est is Lun Tha, played by Charles Reid and Chris­t­ian Roberts.

Ray­mond Choo Kong will di­rect the show.

"Ray­mond has been my friend and men­tor for the past eight years and when I ap­proached John with the idea of pro­duc­ing the­atre in 2012, we could think of no one bet­ter suit­ed. Ray­mond has di­rect­ed it all in the­atre, from dra­ma like Mary Could Dance, to com­e­dy–Nor­man is that You–and he has had hands-on ex­pe­ri­ence with large-scale mu­si­cals, such as the Wiz­ard of Oz and the Lit­tle Mer­maid," Jug­mo­han said.

At a re­hearsal last week, Choo Kong was caught whistling a live­ly tune along with the ac­tors as they were put through their paces. When asked about his role as di­rec­tor, Choo Kong said he was seek­ing out new chal­lenges in the­atre. "I am try­ing to move away from per­form­ing to do more di­rect­ing and train­ing."

Dur­ing a break he shared a bit more about his ex­pe­ri­ence in mu­si­cal the­atre. "I do dif­fer­ent types of the­atre, and do­ing mu­si­cals takes me back to train­ing in the tent"–refer­ing to He­len Camps' Tent The­atre of the 1980s, where many a Trinida­di­an thes­pi­an cut her or his teeth.

"There are cer­tain fun­da­men­tals and foun­da­tions that re­main. I've al­so worked with chil­dren be­fore. With them there is usu­al­ly a lot of work to be done and in­dis­ci­pline to be quelled. But mu­sic makes it eas­i­er and they au­di­tion, so they know what they are get­ting in­to and what is re­quired."

The mu­si­cal team for The King and I com­pris­es Gre­go­ry Wong Fo Sue, an ac­com­plished pi­anist/key­boardist and Lo­raine Grander­son, mu­sic teacher and choir di­rec­tor at Bish­op Anstey High School, Port-of-Spain. The mu­si­cal ac­com­pa­ni­ment will in­clude the Bish­op Anstey High School Choir and Steel En­sem­ble, and per­cus­sion­ist Ever­ald "Red­man" Wat­son, along with two french horns and one oboist, cre­at­ing a dis­tinc­tive clas­si­cal/lo­cal com­bi­na­tion.

The tech­ni­cal crew in­cludes Gre­go­ry Singh, stage man­ag­er; Bente Lash­ley, light­ing; Trel­don Thomp­son, sound; and Christo­pher Smith, pro­duc­tion man­ag­er. Chore­og­ra­phy will be done by Abeo Jack­son along with mas­ter dancer, chore­o­g­ra­ph­er and tu­tor Dr Sat Balka­rans­ingh. Cos­tume de­sign­er is Mar­garet Shep­pard and set de­sign­er is Ran­dal Halfhide.– Ja­nine Charles-Far­ray

The King and I opens at NA­PA, Port-of-Spain, with a gala on April 25 and pub­lic per­for­mances through April 28. There will al­so be spe­cial per­for­mances for schools, as well as a South gala at the Na­pari­ma Bowl in San Fer­nan­do on May 15 with pub­lic per­for­mances up to May 18. A fi­nal run will take place at Queen's Hall, St Ann's, from May 29-June 2.

–Ja­nine Charles-Far­ray

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