As the jam packed season draws to an end, it’s time to take a look back at the accomplishments of the season.

The season opened in late September with the musical Songs for  a New World written and composed by Jason Robert Brown which featured eight Creighton students.  The show was a compilation of musical numbers that each presented characters in a moment of decision with the overall message of hope for a better world.  The show offered an abstract alternative to the more conventional musicals that a typical theatre-goer may be used to.

The next show of the season was The Merry Wives of Windsor: A Wild West Romp, an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s original play by Alan Klem.  The show takes the audience to the fictional town of Windsor, Nebraska where a notorious cowboy rolls through town with the plan to seduce two of the married women of the town; however, these wives have a plan to put the visitor in his place.  With a number of subplots stemming from the families of the wives and their plan to get back at the guest, the show stayed upbeat and kept the audience engaged.

For the first time, the season featured an opera called The Mediumwritten by Gion Carlo Menotti.  The opera featured a handful of Creighton students as well as faculty member Wendy Eaton.  The show follows Baba, a phony psychic who cons people who have lost loved ones into thinking that they are connecting with the departed.  Also featuring Baba’s daughter and an adopted orphan boy, chaos strikes the home when strange things begin to happen, possibly because of spirits.

The dance department started off with the semiannual tradition of performing the winter classic, The Nutcracker.  The story begins with a party, during which Clara receives a Nutcracker from her uncle.  It is later revealed that the Nutcracker is magic and comes to life.  He then takes Clara to the land of sweets, run by the Sugar Plum fairy.  The iconic ballet is set to the music of Chicovski’s Nutcracker Suite.

The season continued with an original production of Gone the Rainbow, Return the Dove written by faculty member Michael McCandless.  Starting with the American Revolution through the conflict in Afghanistan, the play followed the lives of the people who lived through the wars through letters sent to and from the soldiers on the warfront.  With both scenes and monologues connected by both live and recorded music, the play showcased sixteen actors and actresses.

Urinetown: The Musical written by Mark Hollmann and Greg Kotis is a satirical musical that takes place in a fictional town that is suffering from an intense drought which leads to the extreme conservation of water via outlawing the use of private toilets.  As the show goes on and the daughter of the business tycoon who runs the toilets falls for the lowly assistant who runs the local amenity, along with the constant threat of being sent to the ominous Urinetown, the town gets turned upside down.

The final dance show of the season was choreographed by a combination of guests, faculty and student choreographers.  Additionally, many technical aspects of the show were taken on by students and faculty alike, such as costumes and lighting.  The show featured an eclectic mix of dances with varying themes such as the struggle between good and evil, unstable relationships, as well as more upbeat, uplifting numbers.

The season ends this weekend with the Student Production, The Children’s Hour, directed by Arts & Sciences junior Carli Haney.  The show follows two Massachusetts school teachers in the 1930s.  When one of the girls at the boarding school starts a vicious rumor, turmoil is unleashed onto the small town.  The show opened on Thursday with two more showings on Friday and Saturday at 7:30 in the Studio Theatre of the Lied Education Center for the Arts.