This month, Camden Catholic High School will celebrate a century of performing arts excellence, memories made from “The Victory of the Cross” to “The Little Mermaid,” with an evening highlighting alumni and current musical theater students – both on-stage performers and those working behind the curtain.
The upcoming centennial has generated palpable excitement among the students, staff, administrators and families planning the retrospective evening. “They are putting their heart and soul into this,” school President Mary Whipkey said regarding the April 30 gathering in the school’s Grandi Auditorium.
She still remembers her first time experiencing the magic of the Camden Catholic stage in 1982, when she went with her husband, Colin (then a business teacher at the school), to see “The Sound of Music.”
A fan of musicals then and now, she recalls being “blown away by the first class acting, singing, music and set design.”
Since then, she’s missed only a handful of shows. Her own children have been a part of the theater tradition, working behind the scenes in lighting (Patrick, Class of 2001) and makeup (Molly, Class of 2003).
This month’s celebration, a revue of the past 100 years, will have theater students past and present gracing the stage and pit orchestra for musicals such as “42nd Street,” “Les Misérables” and “Fiddler on the Roof.”
“Today’s students are excited about performing with the alumni; they realize they’re a part of the bigger picture,” Whipkey said.
Making History
From 1922, when the school’s first show, “The Victory of the Cross,” was performed at the Lyceum on the school’s previous Camden campus – two years after the school was founded by the Sisters of Mercy – to its current auditorium in Cherry Hill, 10,000 students have been part of the performing arts program, either on or off the stage, or in the pit orchestra.
This historical narrative includes the world and local events that affected students, such as World War II, when many left school to enlist in the U.S. Armed Forces; the 1960 fire in Camden that destroyed much of the original school; and the COVID-19 pandemic, which limited the 2020 and 2021 productions.
Through these events, the students “pushed through … to make sure ‘the show went on,’” Whipkey said.
Whipkey is co-chair of the 100th anniversary celebration along with Brian Fitzgerald, a theater alumnus from the Class of 1987 and an Irish parent.
For his first three years as a Camden Catholic student, he sat in the orchestra pit as first trumpet. When his senior year rolled around and the show was casting for “Fiddler on the Roof,” he knew he wanted to move onstage.
“I remembered sitting in the pit, looking up at the stage, and admiring the actors and how fun it looked for them. I knew that if I didn’t try out then …” Fitzpatrick said, adding that he scored the lead of Tevye.
The next year, even though a freshman majoring in radio/film/tv at Temple University, he was asked back five days before Camden Catholic opened that year’s production of “West Side Story,” after the student playing Tony fell ill.
Fitzpatrick chuckles as he recalls getting the call from Joe Farina, then-theater director, to take on the role on short notice.
“I told him I wasn’t sure I could learn the lines, dancing, singing and blocking” in less than a week, he explained.
“Mr. Farina told me that this was the usual lead time for Broadway actors” before a show’s opening, Fitzpatrick said, explaining that he accepted, filling in for those first performances. The following weekend, the original student actor stepped back into the role.
Fitzpatrick credits Farina, as well as past musical director Joe Gianfortune – “two very special mentors,” he calls them – for providing a skillset that carried into his professional career as a corporate businessman. They provided “a foundation in opening my creative mind, thinking outside the box. The arts taught me discipline, helped me find my voice, and learn that if you set your mind and stay focused, you can accomplish anything.”
Fitzpatrick has been involved with the school’s performing arts department for the last eight years, serving as its business manager and helping manage its website, ticket sales and playbook. In addition, he and his wife, Christy, have given out the Susan Black Fitzpatrick Memorial Scholarship Fund for the past 20 years to a graduating Camden Catholic performing arts student. The honor is named after Brian’s first wife, Susan, whom he met at the school, and who passed away in 1998.
He praises the “parents, alumni, students, theater alumni who have come back to give back” – now and in the past – who have “kept up the tradition of excellence.”
“Theater is the great equalizer,” he believes, saying that everyone involved, including the audience, “are all together in this creative realm, witnessing moments, songs as one unified family.”
Part of a Legacy
Working with Whipkey and Fitzpatrick is Angela Leone Carrozzino, an alumnus of the school’s performing arts program and Camden Catholic’s theatrical director for the past eight years. She hopes to pass on the lessons she’s learned to the next generation.
“Acting teaches you empathy; you’re forced to step into the shoes of characters” and learn their history and perspective, she said. During the three-to-four-month process from auditioning to final curtain, students also understand that “they’re capable of more than they think they are [as they] push themselves.”
One of the recipients of Carrozzino’s wisdom has been school senior Giovanna Torchia, who played the lead role of Ariel in the March production of “The Little Mermaid.”
A four-year veteran of the Irish performing arts – her freshman year on prop crew and the last three years onstage – Torchia credits her director with helping her realize that “you have to believe in yourself; hard work does pay off when you put in the time.”
She said she is also excited to share the stage with and learn from her theater predecessors, feeling “lucky and blessed to be a part of this show” and having the opportunity to work with women and men “who’ve put their blood, sweat and tears into Camden Catholic’s performing arts.”
“It’s really special,” she said.
The longevity and culture of the school’s performing arts program that makes alumnus “come back to give back” is indicative of its “distinct and strong” heritage, noted Msgr. Andrew Martin, president emeritus of Camden Catholic, who still remembers sitting in the theater seats as a grade-schooler watching his older sister, MaryAnn, play the lead in the school’s 1954 production of “The Prince of Pilsen.”
Hooked ever since, “I don’t miss a performance.”
In addition to the career skills that students can acquire from participating in the performing arts, Msgr. Martin knows the program is integral to Camden Catholic’s mission in helping students “serve God and others fostering a just society.”
Since his arrival in 1984 as the school’s principal, Msgr. Martin has kept up an annual tradition of holding Mass for theater crew in the auditorium the Sunday of Tech Week, which begins the most important days of preparation leading to opening night.
“The performing arts experience is a microcosm of who God is calling us to be, as His disciples,” Msgr. Martin said, most notably learning how to “build community, recognize and appreciate the unique skills of others, and practicing discipline and hard work” in achieving a common goal.
If You Go
• Camden Catholic High School’s Celebration of 100 Years of Musical Theater: 1922-2022 will take place April 30 in the school’s Grandi Auditorium, 300 Cuthbert Road in Cherry Hill. Doors open at 6:30 p.m., with curtain at 7 p.m. Cocktails and an afterparty will follow at 8:30 p.m. All-inclusive tickets, $100 ages 21 and up; $50 ages under 21, include show, afterparty, open bar, hors d’oeuvres, live entertainment, silent auction and raffle, and piano bar.
• On May 1, there will be a 100 year celebratory Mass and communion breakfast, also in the Grandi Auditorium.
• For tickets, sponsorships and program ads, visit camdencatholic.org/arts100 or call 856-663-2247, ext. 134.
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