Newtown Resident Is Making Fools Of Mortals

By Eliza Hallabeck

She started her singing career at the Newtown Middle School, and now she is counting down the days until she makes her debut as the Shakespearian prankster Puck. Newtown resident Kayla Koschel will be playing the traditionally male role in Western Connecticut State University’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, to be presented at Ives Concert Park July 18 and 19.  The 90-minute adaptation features WCSU theater arts students and alumni as well as some local actors.

Kayla, in an interview Tuesday, said she realized in seventh grade, during a production of How To Eat Like A Child, that she loves to sing and perform for the people in her life.

“Acting makes me feel like I am somewhere else,” she said. “You just forget what’s going on in your life, because you are the character.”

During her Newtown High School career, Kayla participated in the productions of  Anything Goes and Les Miserable. She said she also worked for Downtown Cabaret Theatre in Bridgeport during her junior year at Newtown High School.

Once her seventh grade choir teacher, Jonathan Pope, taught her to sing, she said she wanted to continue with it. She sang for her eighth grade moving up ceremony, softball games around town, and once she sang for a Bridgeport Bluefish baseball game.   

Now in her junior year at Western Connecticut State University, Kayla is majoring in theater performance.

“I plan on going to graduate school so I can teach acting,” she said.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, written by William Shakespeare, is a play about two pairs of lovers who find themselves in the woods with spirits. The lovers’ true infatuations become shifted as Puck, the right hand helper of the Fairy King, tries to right an already mixed up mess of intentions.

The cast of A Midsummer Night’s Dream also includes Sean Zackrison, of Chappaqua, N.Y., as Oberon; Jennifer Billingsley, of Somers, N.Y., as Titania; Crystal Schewe, of Bethel, as Fairy; Jessica Almeida, of Stratford, as Hermia; Jessica Costello, of West Haven, as Helena; Adam Schofield-Bodt, of Shelton, as Lysander; and Frank Beaudry, of Oakville, as Demetrius.

The show is being produced by Professor of Theater Arts Frank Herbert and directed by Associate Professor of Theater Arts Pam McDaniel.

“I’ve been told by people that I remind them of Puck,” Kayla said. “Even before I tried out for this. So that’s funny.”

When she found out A Midsummer Night’s Dream would be put on at the Ives Concert Park this summer, she said, she knew she wanted a part. She tried out for one of the lead female roles. When she found out she had gotten the role of Puck, she was excited, and went out and rented the movie immediately to start studying the part.

“We’ve tried focusing on a lot of different animals to get me into the role,” said Kayla. “Right now I am focusing on a unicorn.”

She said she has also been training and practicing moves for the performance. She runs in one spot, and jumps around a lot, she said.

Puck is traditionally a male role, but Kayla said she refers to Puck as a “she.” The role means the actor playing the part must be mirthful and lively. Puck is the character in the play that first messes up the plot, but in the end “she” also restores it.

“Puck is a prankster, and that isn’t necessarily Kayla,” said director Pam McDaniel, the associate chair of the Theatre Department at Western Connecticut State University. “But she knows how to do it.”

Ms McDaniel said she directed the first play Kayla was in at Western Connecticut State University.

“She’s like sunshine on the stage,” Ms McDaniel said. “There is just a brightness on the stage.”

Kayla said she is excited to get to jump around the stage and cause all the mischief in this production.

“I’m supposed to be going around and putting magical spells on people,” Kayla said about playing Puck, “and everything keeps getting messed up. I like how much fun Puck has in anything she does.”

Kayla explained that when she is on stage she listens to the audience and the other performers and just reacts to what she hears.

“I love to entertain everyone in my life,” said Kayla.

(Performances of A Midsummer Night’s Dream will be at 7:30 pm Friday and Saturday, July 18 and 19. The performances will be in Ives Concert Park on WestConn’s westside campus, off Mill Plain Road.

Tickets are $20 for adults, $15 for students, and $10 for senior citizens and children ages 3-12.

Families are encouraged to arrive as early at 6:30 pm so that children can participate in creative dramatic crafts and games and then to become part of the production. For additional information call WCSU’s Office of University Relations, 837-8486.)