Sandra Huntsman is a Singer, Actor, Costume Designer & Costume Build Specialist & Producer, Production Manager. She’s done pretty much everything you can think of and more. Sandra started her love of the theatre as an actress. Some of her favorite roles to date include Belle in DISNEY’S BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, Paulette in LEGALLY BLONDE THE MUSICAL, The Lady of the Lake in MONTY PYTHON'S SPAMALOT, Irene in CRAZY FOR YOU, Miss Dorothy in THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE, Mrs Walker in THE WHO’S TOMMY, Eliza in MY FAIR LADY, SMOKEY JOE’S CAFÉ and GODSPELL.
Along the way, she started constructing and designing costumes, for which she has received well deserved acclaim, and is now in demand as a costumer, often costuming 3-4 productions a year. Favorite costume projects include THE DROWSY CHAPERONE, HAIRSPRAY, DAMN YANKEES, PETER PAN, THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE, ALL SHOOK UP, ELTON JOHN & TIM RICE’S AIDA and DISNEY’S BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. Sandra has co-produced (alongside her husband, Steve) full scale musical productions, including NEXT TO NORMAL, THE MUSIC MAN, DISNEY’S BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, TARZAN and DISNEY'S THE LITTLE MERMAID. Sandra has a great passion for music and has produced and co-created several concerts, cabarets and variety shows including the Broadway and Beyond Cabaret Series, Keepin' It Country - A High Energy Country Music Revue and Be Our Guest - a Magical Disney Musical Revue. She has created and produced the main stage entertainment for the Springs Preserve's Haunted Harvest and continues to perform regularly in Las Vegas, appearing in musical theatre as well as cabarets, concerts, bands and more. She's a member of the country vocal group Ghostlight and sings with Spirit Productions' The Celtic Ladies.
Anyone who’s anyone in the Las Vegas theatre world knows Sandra Huntsman and Huntsman Entertainment. My build partner and I have had the privilege of building a number of their award winning sets: they’re big, heavy, solid and gorgeous. Their newly imagined production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast was expected to premiere in March and well, we all know what happened - COVID-19 and the complete shutdown of the entertainment industry. Devastated would be the understatement in how we all (the theatre community) felt. We know they were two weeks out from their final dress rehearsal when Sandra got the call from the performance venue, Henderson Pavilion: They canceled all productions. Everything fell apart, but the cast came together for one final run of “Be Our Guest” and sadly said “adieu” to each other as the night ended. It’s the show that never happened and instead of loading the sets, props and costumes into the theatre the following Monday, March 16, 2020, they instead loaded everything in their storage space, with the hope that one day soon, the production will finally get the chance to light the candles and set the table.
Later on in the interview we talked about the future of theatre, in this, our new normal and I think we all agreed to the conclusion: if we were to only have half an audience for each performance we would need to double the number of performances, which means spending more money on theatre rentals. On top of this, you can’t have a cast wearing masks on stage and how do we protect the crew? Tickets prices would need to be raised, but less people would buy tickets because frankly, who has the money.
Live streaming was another topic we touched upon and Sandra made a solid argument against getting involved. Streaming with no audience just doesn’t cut it. You don’t get that guttural response that you would normally get from an audience. The energy would be gone and you would still need to address the issue of health and safety for the cast and crew. We all agree that people want to see live entertainment, but without a full audience, that are still not comfortable entering a confined space like a theatre, it will just take time.
Sandra is currently taking a well deserved creative “Time Out”, but is still contributing to the community by making masks and helping with the health and safety issues that are still plaguing our world. As she said, and I quote, “Who would have thought that sewing would be an essential service.” Now we know what she’s going to be doing with all that spare time and material - Making Masks
Thank you Sandra for being “Our Guest” on the “What’s Next?” Zoom Chat Series. We can’t wait to see what you come up with in the future.