Let’s listen to it for the 30-year race of Kevin Hauge at CMT San Jose

When the music theater for children San Jose will open the “waitress” on April 11, it will be an important opportunity, the start of the end of Kevin Hauge, which retired this summer after 30 years as artistic director of the theater company for young people.

“For many people, CMT and Kevin Hauge are synonymous,” said Dana Zell, Director General of CMT San Jose. “It’s quite incredible for an artistic director.”

The musical Sara Bareilles is one of the last two shows that Hauge will run at Montgomery Theater before taking its last arcs this summer. His latest show will be “Disney’s Frozen” at the end of July, a main production for secondary artists and university age. But “waitress” – which has nine performances until April 20 – will be one of the CMT brand emissions, with a casting that presents adult actors and CMT alumni, many of which grew up with Hauge leading them on stage.

The applause should be deafening and the dresser of the standing road to properly recognize what Hauge meant for the theater of youth of the region and the thousands of young artists with whom he worked in hundreds of shows during these decades.

Hauge arrived in South Bay in 1982 as choreographer of Great America’s shows in Santa Clara, and over the next five years, he also worked as a choreographer and director for the children’s musical theater, which had been founded in 1968. It was at that time that Zell met her when she played a Winkie in a production of 1985 of “The Wiz”.

“Even then, he was not the artistic director, but he had returned several times to direct individual shows,” she recalls. “But being part of a Kevin show was a big problem.”

His work took him to Texas for a few years, where he got married and founded a family. It was at this point that Michael Mulcahy – then a former CMT interpreter who had assumed the role of executive director and is now a member of the Municipal Council of San Jose – called by asking if he could be an emergency filling director for their summer broadcast, “Guys and Dolls”.

“It was the most important eight weeks of my life because it was in these eight weeks, as a young man at the start of the thirties, I realized that it was there that I had to be. This is where I was supposed to be,” said Hauge last month at a Rotary Club meeting in San Jose. “I was supposed to create art, certainly, but it was more important for me to work with young people and to share with them what I had learned.”

Eighteen months later, Mulcahy and the CMT board of directors hired Hauge as the company’s first artistic director. Under the mandate of Hauge, CMT has developed – by now producing 11 shows per year for different age groups, as well as summer camps and courses – and has pushed the limits of what “children’s theater” means with quality productions of shows like “the miserables”, “Billy Elliott”, “The Who’s Tommy”, “Rent” and “American Idress”.

The CMT alumni continued to play on Broadway, in national touring, on television and movies. The work of the company was recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts, and The Hague was an honorable mention for the Tony Award for Excellence in Theater Education in 2016.

Hauge says that these are very proud things, but it is just as proud of CMT artists who continue to be doctors, teachers, engineers, nurses or any other life choice.

“We are on the life lessons that we give to young people through the arts of the show,” he said, by checking skills such as time management and problem solving. “We want you to use these universal life lessons in your future.”

Alex Brightman and Ryan Vasquez, two CMT alumni who went to the nominations of Broadway Success and Tony Award, praised Hauge in a video they recorded for the annual CMT fund collection gala, which was held at San Jose Civic on February 1.

“One of the things we have shared is one of the things Kevin taught us very early on to CMT, which is community theater is exactly that,” said Brightman, who played Vasquez in the production of “Schmigadoon!” This month at Kennedy Center. “This is the community, and we welcomed ourselves through the many shows that we have made in many years.”

This gala was really a tribute to Hauge, filled with performances of more than 100 actors, singers and dancers in number of the last three decades of shows. Some arrived on flights from across the country, with a short time to repeat before resuming roles, they may have played for the last time a decade ago or more ago. Each participant has received a note thanking them signed “Bravo, K”, a nod to the inspiring notes that Hauge gives to his young artists.

During a large part of the brunch and dinner -spectacles, when he was not on stage, Hauge looked at the performance of the rear – with his expressions sometimes more like those of a proud parent than a stage director.

“Thirty years ago, I had this epiphany of saying:” Oh, I think I can really help these children “, but whoever was in the room with this group of CMT people knows that it is the children who really helped me,” said Hauge. “They gave me energy and goal and an interest in life that I have never thought of being able.

“And I really count my days until I will be finished, but I know that the next few days for the children’s theater will be remarkable, and I can’t wait to see what they are doing.”

Arias in the afternoon: The San Jose Woman’s Club celebrates its 130th anniversary by bringing one of its most popular events – the opera lunch with the stars – for the first time from the COVVI -19 pandemic. The April 10 event will include performances of artists residents of the San Jose Opera, which should sound well due to the acoustics of the clubhouse historic.

The product of the event will benefit the San Jose University in university and vocal study scholarships. The vocal scholarships were launched by the late Alma Taylor, and an inheritance of his succession made them advance, but this year, he will restart the financing of university scholarships.

Tickets are $ 80 for full lunch followed by performance, or people with a stricter schedule can opt for dessert and $ 25 performance. Tickets are available on OperalNunch.eventbrite.com or by calling 408-294-6919.

County concerns: Santa Clara County Director James Williams will discuss what federal cuts could mean for the county programs and services – as well as the way the county reacts – during a meeting on April 7 which is organized by the South Bay Democratic Coalition. The 7 p.m. meeting will be held at 2901, avenue Moorpark, continuation 110, but you can watch online by sending an email to rakstoken@sbcglobal.net for more information.

Originally published: April 5, 2025 at 6:30 am Pdt