Brownsville gem: Camille Playhouse to stage ‘Bye Bye Birdie’

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Rehearsals are underway at the Camille Playhouse, which will wrap up its Diamond Jubilee season May 10-12 and 17-19, with “Bye Bye Birdie,” the 1950s send up about small-town America teenagers, rock & roll and the Elvis Presley-inspired teen idol Conway Birdie.

The Camille, founded in 1963, is Texas’ oldest operating community theater south of San Antonio. Many regard it as the gem of Brownsville.

The 60th anniversary season has seen the Camille emerge from the pandemic as all-important live audiences return to the theater.

“We are now on ‘The Fantasticks’ and then we finish with ‘Bye Bye Birdie,’” Artistic Director Brandon Binder said earlier this week inside the much loved theater in Dean Porter Park.

Natalia Garza is the volunteer director for “Bye Bye Birdie” but is no stranger to the cast or characters. She has been associated with the Camille since age 11, first as as a participant in kids summer workshops, then directing them. She most recently directed the last two Christmas Cabaret fundraising performances.

She said when Binder approached her about directing “Bye, Bye Birdie” she quickly agreed, knowing the show’s potential to involve kids and adults and to support a large cast, in this case 35, including Martie DiGregorio, president of the Camille’s board of directors.

“Bye Bye Birdie” won the Tony Award for best musical of 1961 and has been captivating audiences on and off Broadway ever since.

Garza recently was hired as an assistant director in the Harlingen school district’s theater program.

“Ever since I got my director’s hat on I’ve been wanting to do a main stage production at Camille. It has been a goal of mine. ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ was perfect because I really value a production where there’s kids and adults as well, because I feel both groups learn from each other,” Garza said.

She noted that both Binder and DiGregorio are cast in the show.

When asked to describe “Bye Bye Birdie,” her reaction was, “It’s so funny.”

“When we did our first read-through the whole cast was just laughing. For example Martie DiGregorio was cast as Mrs. Peterson, who is this hilarious, overbearing, just super dramatic mother, and it’s so funny to see Martie in that role because Martie is someone who in the best way can be very big and dramatic and can tell great stories, and she just has a very big personality, so seeing her in a role that semi represents her in that way is just so fun to watch, and so everyone was just dying laughing when she was saying her lines because she was just so silly, and the character herself is just so silly,” Garza said.

“What’s so special about this show is you’re going to see people who are normally behind the scenes come to life and then see some familiar faces and also some new faces that haven’t been on the Camille stage in quite some time,” Garza said.

For her part, DiGregorio said the Camille’s educational aspect is “one of the things that we’re most proud of. Yes, we entertain, but we also educate and we expose the community to the live performing arts.”

“It’s wonderful to know how to paint and to sing and to do all of those things, but we just have the passion for live stage performances, and we are proud that we can educate our children and expose them to that, and one of the ways that we educate them is offering the summer workshop for the kids. I love that,” DiGregorio added

The summer workshops, which are for ages 5-17, are tuition based, but last summer were near capacity, Binder said.

“It’s a four week camp where the kids come in and learn everything it takes to do a musical — music choreography, the dancing, but also for the older kids, how to design a stage, how to costume manage. Literally every aspect of a performance they get to learn about and run, and then at the end of the four weeks they get to put on their performance. I am a product of that workshop,” he said.

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