This year’s Waa-Mu show, “Keeping Time,” will carry special significance when it opens Friday: 2010 is Dominic Missimi’s last year directing.
“I’ve had a wonderful 17 years directing it and have met so many incredible students and writers,” said Missimi, who has worked at Northwestern for 30 years. “Obviously it’s a sort of sad moment, but I’m really looking forward to changes. I’m looking forward to what new things will happen with Waa-Mu under a new director.”
This year’s show has the largest cast yet, co-chair Lindsay Powell said. “Keeping Time” will feature everything from conquerors’ secret passions to the animals left off of Noah’s Ark, she said.
“The show is all about time and especially history and going back,” the Communication senior said. “It’s going to be really exciting and colorful and fun. There’s a big mix of music.”
This is Waa-Mu’s 79th year, Missimi said. Students begin working on the show during Fall Quarter, said Powell, who is co-chairing the show with fellow Communication senior RB Embleton. Waa-Mu is entirely student written.
“What’s really great about Waa-Mu is that there are so many different types of music in one show that you would never usually see in one place,” Powell said. “There’s really funny songs and really contemporary songs and some really interesting art songs.”
Jon Kwock, who plays Michael Jackson, a gold digger and a ghost, “among others,” said the show was exciting to perform in.
“How do you even describe it?” the Communication junior said. “It is a spectacle like nothing you would ever see anywhere else on campus. We have the best costumes, the biggest set and lights and everything.”
The show gets its name from two student groups, the Women’s Athletic Association and the Men’s Union, which started the show in 1929.
“It’s a celebration of student talent: not just the performers, all of whom are very talented from the music theater program, but also because it’s young songwriters and lyricists and playwrights,” Missimi said. “The University needs to support that, especially the students. It’s like you’re supporting your own friends and people who live in your dorm or your fraternity.”
The show is an NU tradition that gives students an opportunity to see their work evolve over the year, Powell said.
“It’s a very unique platform for students to write their own original work and to have it shown,” she said. “You’ll see a song in the Fall Quarter come from just an idea to a few chords, to go from a lyric sheet all the way to a full piece of sheet music that 50 people are learning.”
The show will run from April 30 until May 9.
Though it’s Missimi’s last time directing, he said he is not quite done with the show.
“It’s not like I’m going to be leaving Waa-Mu,” Missimi said. “I’ll probably be the first one to get a seat next year when my friend David Bell takes over.”
