From schoolyard to the stage

FOR dancer Kiara Kieser, the new $5 million musical Moonshadow, which features the music of Cat Stevens, marks her debut on the professional stage.

And it gives her an opportunity to perform alongside her friend, Gemma-Ashley Kaplan, who plays the major role of Lisa in the musical that premiered at the Princess Theatre in Melbourne last month.

“It’s such a small world having two Scopus girls in the same show,” says Kieser, who was a student at Mount Scopus Memorial College and completed her VCE in 2007.

“We are good family friends. Gemma was a few years ahead of me at school, but we have known each other for a long time.”

Kieser is a member of the ensemble and one of two female swings (understudies) in the show.

“The swings also understudy the other female performers in the ensemble in the unlikely event that if anything goes wrong or someone is injured, we can step in and continue at any time,” she explains.

The musical is set in a futuristic fantasy world where a young man and his moonshadow – Stormy (played by Gareth Keegan) and Lisa (Kaplan) – join forces on a mission to restore light to a darkened world.

The musical, which has a mixture of Stevens’ hits and new songs especially written for the show, also stars Robert Grubb, Jolyon James and Blake Bowden.

“The show is so special because there is so much singing to carry the story, along with the dancing,” says Kieser, who was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and moved to Melbourne with her family when she was eight.

“I was dance caption at school  and took part in most of the school ­productions.”
After completing her VCE she won a scholarship to study full-time at Spectrum Dance, a professional dance college in Burwood, where she spent two years.

“It was very intense, spending from nine to five on non-stop dance every day,” says Kieser, who also spent four years with the Australian Ballet School.

“In the past few years I have put a lot of focus on my singing and acting as I have tried to move into the corporate world and get roles in musicals.”

Kieser grew up with the music of Stevens, explaining that her parents loved the hit songs from the late 1960s and 1970s, such as Father and Son, Wild World and Morning Has Broken, which were heard around the house.

“Now that I am hearing them every day in the show, it is quite surreal. My favourites are First Cut is the Deepest and Wild World.”

In 1977 Stevens dropped out of pop music, became a Muslim and changed his name to Yusuf Islam. In recent years, Islam has stepped back into the limelight, performing in concerts and basing himself in Melbourne to work on the Moonshadow musical.

REPORT by Danny Gocs

PHOTO of Gemma-Ashley Kaplan (left) and Kiara Kieser.  Photo by Charles Newbury