HighBall Performances include Zombies, Transvestites, and Demons, OH MY!

This year’s HighBall Halloween will be full of theatrical fun as many of Columbus’ best theatre companies will be giving “spooktacular” performances.

            Short North Stage, CATCO, Olympic Theatre and Imagine Productions all will participating in this year’s celebration. All 4 companies will be taking the stage throughout the night doing numbers from their current productions, many Halloween themed.

Short North Stage will be kicking off the night at 8 p.m. with a performance from their production of Steven Sondheim’s Follies, the inaugural musical at the reopened Garden Theatre.

“Our group will performing the opening number from Follies, ‘Beautiful Girls.’ It will be a way to introduce our showgirls,” said Rick Gore, co-founder of the Short North Stage and Follies producer.

The company from the Olympic Theatre, Columbus’ “boldest, hottest, bar theatre,” will take the stage soon after, at 9 p.m., to perform pieces from their production of Zombie Prom.

“We have been on the design team for the giant puppets and will be acting as the puppeteers for the evening. Our company will also be performing on the main stage a medley from Zombie Prom to showcase the diversity, strength, talent and creativity of our company,” Decker added.

“Our company's performance involvement is two fold,” said Todd Decker, a co-founder of the group.

Next on the theatre schedule is CATCO, taking the stage to do a number from their current production of Evil Dead- the Musical, a show all about college students who unleash an evil demon and the trusty hero that saves them from its wrath.

“Becoming a part of the celebration feeds our company’s desire to push our own limits,” Anderson mentions, regarding his company’s involvement with this year’s HighBall celebration.

 “In the spirit of Halloween we will be performing ‘Do the Necronomicon’ from Evil Dead- the Musical,” said Steven Anderson, Artistic Director of CATCO.

Finally, the very last performance of the night will take place at midnight when Imagine Productions fuels the Halloween spirit with a performance from The Rocky Horror Show. The performance is sure to feed HighBall goers fix for Rocky Horror, a Halloween tradition for many.

For all of these groups, there is a sense of excitement for being able to perform at HighBall Halloween, such a great, new tradition for Columbus.

“HighBall is a paradigm for community involvement,” says Decker. “It is an example of what can be done when a group of people stretch their boundaries by asking themselves ‘What if?’ Columbus in general and the Short North in particular are creative hubs. HighBall draws bold attention to who we are as a city.”