Best of Broadway Tradition Celebrates 50th Anniversary

By: Damon Markiewicz

For Springfield College alumnus Dennis St. Jean ’73, a simple walk with friends during the spring of 1973 hatched an idea that has turned into one of the great student-led productions at the College. That vision was the introduction of the Best of Broadway theater production. St. Jean recently returned to the campus to celebrate his 50th Reunion Year festivities, and he took a trip down memory lane to reminisce about how Best of Broadway production remains a popular Springfield College tradition.

“Myself and two of my friends were walking together one night, and we started talking about how there wasn’t going to be a spring music concert because the professor was on sabbatical, and we talked about how my high school chorus would have a performance that highlighted Broadway shows,” explained St. Jean. My two buddies, Vincent Scott ‘73 and Robert Parker ’74, were into the theater, and I was more of a singer. So, we decided to throw some feelers out there and see if there would be interest in hosting a show highlighting Broadway performance, and just take a shot at it.”

Much to St. Jean’s surprise, the result was more than 100 students showing up to audition for the 1973 performance, momentum that wouldn’t slow down as word spread throughout the campus that the live performance was being organized by students.

“The response from students was very impressive,” added St. Jean. “It was actually a little overwhelming, but it was exciting to have so many students interested. It really surprised some people on campus just how much interest there was. We quickly realized we had a show to organize, and the next challenge was to figure out how we organize over 100 students wanting to perform.”

With St. Jean also being the treasurer of the student activities council, he wanted to make sure the performance was open to all students. St. Jean and the leaders of the show came up with the idea to have two casts to accommodate the large number of participants. The casts would do the best numbers from six selected Broadway shows.

“During the first Best of Broadway performance, it was more of a Broadway revue,” added St. Jean, who recently viewed the current students’ version of Beauty and the Beast performed during the 2023 spring semester.

As Best of Broadway popularity has only increased over the years, the need for two shows has been incorporated into the club’s schedule, one in the Fall and one in the Spring. In carrying on the tradition of the original show, the current Fall performance remains more of a “Broadway Revue,” a combination of more than 21 numbers from different shows and musicals, combined with sketches written and performed by the students, while the Spring show is one full musical from top to bottom.

“I think it’s great how it has evolved into picking one particular Broadway show in the Spring, but during the early days, it was more of a revue of multiple shows,” added St. Jean. “The one constant you can see is the interest from everyone on campus is just as high now as it was in 1973, the attendance was overflowing in 1973 and it seems to be the same now, which is great to see.”

The crowds were so large for that inaugural show in the spring of 1973, people overflowed Moses Hall, the biggest space available at the College at that time.

“We just packed people in, it was amazing to see,” said St. Jean. “People were setting up folding chairs, finding any room they could to watch the show. We jam packed as many people as we could into that space for the show, it really showed everyone on campus the strong interest there was to watch theater arts on campus.”