TORRANCE TRIBUNE August 6, 2015 Page 7 By TerriAnn Ferren It is that time again, and the Torrance Theatre Company (TTC) is deep in final rehearsals for their summer musical, Hairspray. I was able to sit down for a moment with the brains behind this yearly thespian event, Gia Inferrera, Cultural Services Program Director. Gia has worked tirelessly building, promoting, encouraging and mentoring the Torrance Theatre Company (TTC) since its inception in 1999. By 2004, the summer musical wasn’t the only offering by the talented Gia, because it was then that she instituted a full season of theatre productions. She said, even before the Torrance Theatre Company had a name, it was always about the people participating - and the community. The TTC is the only company associated with the city of Torrance and every summer, Gia, with the help of her trusty team, put on a first rate musical. Years ago, there were many ‘little theatre companies’ in the South Bay. These served as artistic homes for actors searching for a place to hone their skills. But as time went by, the tiny companies, and the medium companies, vanished. It was then, the city of Torrance built a theatre just perfect for the community. Gia was tapped to birth the new theatre ‘company’ and although they didn’t know it at the time, the city of Torrance and Gia Inferrera – Jordahl would together become a team growing a program second to none. “At the time, the Cultural Services Manager was Bob Myers and it was his vision to resurrect a summer musical…[because] it had gone away…but now that we had this facility he really thought this was the right time for the city to get into the game. For me, it was a lot of learning on the job. There were no ground plans of how this was supposed to go – how it was supposed to get done. The arts working inside government is so unique in and of itself – so there wasn’t a notion as to where it was going to go, but the idea was that the community needed this…so I think the goal was just ‘we are going to do as much as the community wants,” said Gia. I asked Gia how she chooses the summer musical and she told me, “You would think there is some magical way this happens. There are many components involved; one, I think about my position; I work for the city of Torrance and my job is the serve the community first and foremost. As I serve the community I am as focused on the process as the product. What are they interested in seeing? What would the city be proud of?” Gia also meets with the directors she works with to get their input. In the last 16 years, Gia has drawn from a core of seven different directors who have worked the summer musical. This year, Jim Hormel is directing Hairspray along with choreographer, Christopher Albrecht, vocal director, Bradley Hampton, and music director Rick Heckman. Gia also confided to me that things are not always easy. There are challenges with working within a budget and making it stretch over costumes, sets, lighting, and the few stipend artists, while still presenting a quality professional show for the citizens of Torrance. Gia’s father is an architect who was working on designing a hospital in Allentown, Pennsylvania when she was growing up, and rumor has it that when Gia was about 3 years old, she ran away from her mother in a department store. Her mom was frantically looking everywhere for her and finally found her in the men’s section standing on top of one of the counters singing. Obviously, Gia enjoyed entertaining from a very young age. When she was 4 years old she finally made “There are challenges with working within a budget and making it stretch over costumes, sets, lighting, and the few stipend artists, while still presenting a quality professional show for the citizens of Torrance.” her debut in a pre school production of ‘I’m a Little Tea Pot.’ “When I was little, I was kind of a - and still am – a social and intellectual butterfly. I move from one thing to another. I Hairspray. love to perform, direct, and write. In school when there was a Christmas pageant and we needed to do this scene – I would figure it out. I’ll do the pledge of allegiance; I will sing that song - I will make up my own song! I didn’t care, I just wanted to perform and be involved,” said Gia. Later in high school Gia performed in a very stylized production of Twelve Angry Jurors, and that left a big imprint on her. Gia loves her job and producing the summer show, and the entire season for the TTC. She taps her husband of 7 years, Cary Jordahl, who is the Theatre Technical Director at Mira Costa High School, for his expertise. Gia’s biggest fans, her loving parents, not only support her unconditionally, but keep her grounded with what is really important, and also volunteer - helping with Gia’s productions. Her inspirational brother, Tad, who is the well-traveled lighting designer at Staples Center and the Master Electrician for Nokia in Los Angeles, is sometimes called to give advice and guidance as well. I asked Gia what she does in her spare time and she told me she reads plays, sees plays, or thinks about plays. She and her husband, Cary recently saw 7 Broadway shows in New York. That is dedication! She also told me, laughing, that Cary is bound to do her bidding – through marriage. “I love working with him, we get along really well, we work well together, we’re just really well suited. I am super lucky to have him, as is the city of Torrance,” gushed Gia. Then I was able to speak with a couple actors from the cast of Hairspray. Jael Nixon, an enthusiastic 16 year old, attends West Torrance High School, and is proud to be part of this production. Jael told me, “I auditioned and am playing L’il (Little) Inez, Seaweed’s sister. It’s like for black females – and it’s pushing for us to be on TV… People of all different races and types that wouldn’t necessarily be on TV at that time – she really helped pushed for that. She played a lot in the protesting and she went to jail for it. She was just like the suffragettes of the 60s.” Jael danced in Debbie Allen’s, Hot Chocolate Nutcracker, but this is her first starring role in a play. “I have a brother, Trevaun age 8 and my sister, Briannah, age 9 who are also into the arts… Dancing came [to me] first. My mom always sang to me. It’s just a thing in our family – we just have it. It was this little Christian bedtime song she would sing to me before bed. It was called, Tell Me the Stories of Jesus, and so she would always sing it to me before bed, and one day – I heard it on the radio,” said Jael. “This is the first time I feel I have broken through…I am really happy that I got a bigger role in Hairspray and next to Hair, it’s my favorite musical,” she said. Jael then went on to say, “I am so grateful to Gia. I thought that because a lot of them [the cast] are older, that I would bond with the younger kids, but we totally bonded. I bonded more with the Seaweed Circle, but I’ve also bonded with the council kids, Corny and Brenda.” Next I spoke with lead, 31 year old, Daniel Tennant, who plays, Edna Turnblad. Daniel told me, “I have about 50 show credits in the South Bay area since I was 9 years old. My parents took me to see a production of Beauty and the Beast when it first came to Los Angeles when I was 9 or 10 and I thought it was amazing to see people on stage singing and dancing telling a story – it was magical. That same year I saw a production of Sound of Music and Oklahoma! and I fell in love with the stage. I love musical theatre and this was kind of a shot in the dark. I came out to audition and I didn’t expect to be cast as a middle-aged woman. It was a very emotional surprise for me when I received the e-mail that I got the part.” When Daniel isn’t performing with Gia, for the past 9 years, he has been working in Long Beach, in the 4 million dollar Ghosts and Legends of The Queen Mary production. Daniel told me he has performed that show over 9 TerriAnn in Torrance Hairspray, the Summer Musical STARS & STRIPES A M E R I C A N M A D E C L O T H I N G S T O R E COME CHECK US OUT! 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