*This interview is actually only a few minutes with her, but to see more of her work, buy a ticket to RENT on April 23-25th!
Name: Cristina Angeles
School & Year: BC ’16
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Where and when did your interest in theater start?
I first started being interested in theater when I went to a Performing Arts Middle School in wonderful, suburban New Jersey, playing the ~*Stewardess*~ in my 8th grade production of “Anything Goes.” I took a ton of chorus classes and played the bass and the alto saxophone for a few years, but I eventually became a Stage Manager in high school, which led me to an interest in directing. We had an amazing performing arts program, and I worked on 2-3 shows a year, mostly musicals. We worked with some incredibly inspiring directors who I eventually dedicated my first show to at the end of my Senior Year, which was a musical review of the best songs of their past shows with us.
You’re been consistently involved in the arts scene at school. Give us some background of the performances you’ve been involved in.
Shout out to Columbia Student Theater!!!! The Columbia Performing Arts League (CUPAL) is the home of an insane number of performing arts groups that have given me so much room to learn and grow. I’m the upcoming President of the Columbia University Players (CUP), which is an organization that puts on straight plays that are 100% directed, produced, designed, and acted by students, and I’m currently directing a production of Jonathan Larson’s RENT for the Columbia Musical Theatre Society (CMTS) to finish up Junior Year! I started Freshman Fall with CMTS’s production of “Hair,” after a friend of mine from home (who was a senior at Barnard at the time and also heavily involved in Student Theater) suggested I interview to Assistant Direct! The next semester I got pulled into CU Players to Stage Manage a production of “Dog Sees God,” which taught me that plays can actually be pretty damn spectacular, and not just an easy excuse to take a nap. I stayed with CU Players for the next 3 semesters actually Stage Managing a new play, “Playgrounds,” with them before directing “The Gift,” for NOMADS (New and Original Material Authored and Directed by Students) in the Fall of 2013. Then, I directed “Next Fall,” with CUP in the spring of 2014, followed by directing a modernized interpretation of “12 Angry Men,” before diving headfirst into “RENT!” If you told me when I was in high school that I would have worked on more plays than musicals in college, I would have legitimately laughed at you, but plays are amazing, and so is CUP!
What’s the best part about directing CMTS’s production of RENT?
This is going to sound so cheesy… oh god… Well, my actors are quite possibly the greatest group of 14 weirdos I could have ever asked to work with, and now call my friends. People say it’s crazy how many hours we rehearse (between 15-19 a week, alongside 3 hours worth of production and design meetings, not including the work that the we all put into the show outside of rehearsal choreographing numbers, blocking scenes, studying music, learning lines, applying for grants, designing sets and costumes, and so much more). But honestly, the 14 actors we have in the RENT Fam have made every minute of rehearsal some of the most fun I have ever had at during my time at Barnard. I miss our show already, and we still have over a month until our show (which goes up April 23rd-25th, 2015). So, I would say that that is my favorite part of directing RENT, alongside of the fact that RENT is possibly the most beautiful show I could ever be a part of. It’s cathartic and therapeutic, its music constantly makes us feel present and together, and it can help you through the even roughest days at Columbia. I warned you, I sound like a cheeseball when I talk about this show, but I am the luckiest person in the world to be the director of this crazy crew.
Favorite RENT song?
There are 42 songs in the show, which is a Rock Opera so songs make up its entirety, and I can narrow it down to a 15-way tie for first place. They’re each so different and unique in their own ways and tell some part of the story of a year in the life of these 8 best friends. It’s impossible to choose! If I had to narrow it down to a top 5, I would probably say “Another Day,” “I’ll Cover You (Reprise),” “La Vie Boheme,” “Finale B,” and “Take Me Or Leave Me,” but that was hard enough.
Where do you hope your directing will take you?
If I am looking at the grand scheme of things, like dreaming BIG dreams, I would love to be the first woman of color to win a Tony for Best Direction of a Play or Musical. But that aside, I really want to be able to one day be able to support myself by putting on theater that relates to audience members by showing them pieces of themselves and their lives on stage. I’m a huge, huge proponent of showcasing the stories of people whose stories are not frequently told as well as showing the faces of people who are not typically seen on stage. It meant the world to me when I was able to relate to the story being told in Lin Manuel Miranda’s production of “In The Heights.” It was the first time I was able to see myself onstage, and it was finally the a show that wasn’t about immigration or racism, littered with stereotypes, but it was still put on by an incredibly diverse creative team and it cast actors of countless different backgrounds. So, no matter what, I want to be able to give people that same feeling I had through theater.