Aurora Fox Executive Producer Charles Packard explains the strategy of ending the season with such a big musical show.

The audience wants large scale shows. They tell us this by buying tickets and subscriptions. Season 31 subscriptions were up 26% which I primarily attribute to reckognizable titles, large scale productions and proven quality. Subscribers show a large degree of trust that a company can deliver. Season 32 is on pace to be up another 10-15% driven by Porgy and Bess and Pricilla, Queen of the Desert.

Piper Arpan McTaggart takes on both Director and Choreographer duties for this large production.

It is such a big show, but in many ways it lends itself to having a director/choreographer. There is a massive amount of music, including underscoring. In fact, once the music begins at the top of ACT I, it's not until half way through the act that we see a scene without underscoring! The pacing is also very fast, as it moves briskly from location to location, so whereas having a counterpart to collaborate with as we shifted from scene to scene would have been costly time wise, I was able to execute my vision seamlessly and efficiently. The biggest challenge was the time crunch which we were under to put up such a huge show, and re-tracking it to suit our case size--which has sixteen LESS members than the Broadway company! As dance takes much longer to get on its feet, and as there is SO much dancing in the show, our rehearsals were very dance-heavy at first. We blocked scene work quickly and didn't get to really dig in until later in the process. As always, I would have loved a few more rehearsal hours in the day to get more work in, but was constantly impressed by the diligence and work ethic of this amazing cast--many of them worked as hard outside of rehearsal learning lines and practicing choreography as they did in rehearsal to be on top of their game with the tight schedule!