Sara Maimone returns to the spotlight
SARA MAIMONE said her background in performance “is something that I have trained to do pretty much my entire life.”
“I consider the stage my home,” the Ocean City resident said. “It is where I belong.”
Sara, however, needed to be reminded of her lifelong calling after breaking from performing for almost two decades.
The impetus to re-enter center spotlight on the stage arrived last summer when her best friend, Michael James Scott, performed with the Ocean City Pops.
“Michael asked – no, told me – that I would be joining him on stage to sing the duet ‘A Whole New World,’” Sara recalled. “I had not performed for an audience in 23 years, although he and I have sung that duet too many times to count.
“Michael reminded me that the stage is my home and that I should be performing with the OC Pops at the Music Pier for my own audiences,” she continued about Scott, who most recently starred as the Genie in “Aladdin” on Broadway. “And so, just like that, I was invited to be featured as the solo artist in the 2023 Holiday Show with conductor Vince Lee and the OC Pops.
To Sara’s surprise – and delight – the show quickly sold out.
“For the first time with an OC Pops holiday concert, over 900 seats were filled,” exclaimed Sara, who is also the library media specialist at Ocean City High School. “With that, I was asked to headline another concert in the 95th season with the OC Pops.”
So on Sunday, August 4, Sara will return to the Music Pier stage for “A Musical Night of Stage & Screen” featuring popular film compositions and Tony Award-winning Broadway arrangements.
“I tried to be pretty selective in my song choices so that somebody from any age group, whether it’s a student of mine or a seasonal subscriber to the Pops, that they would recognize the songs and be able to appreciate them and go on a journey with me through the music and the order that I’ve put them,” Sara said.
Songs range from Judy Garland in the 1930s and 1940s through modern-day Broadway, such as a song from “Hamilton.” Sara connects to many of the selections from childhood.
“Having the opportunity to sing it as an adult with a new meaning and a new understanding is pretty amazing,” she said.
Return to Spotlight
A description for this show spotlighting some of Sara’s favorite composers and lyricists is in the 2024 Season Concerts Brochure produced by the Friends of the Ocean City Pops as well as the online box office.
Tickets are $22 and $27 and can be purchased at ocnj.us/boxoffice.
“Michael Scott and Michael Allegretto played a huge role in putting me back in the spotlight,” said Sara, who has worked in the Ocean City school district since 2006. “The Ocean City Board of Trustees and the Friends of the Ocean City Pops have been so kind in welcoming me back to the stage. And, my husband has been the most supportive, as he was in 2000 and continues to be today, my No. 1 fan.”
Although Sara and her husband, Daniel, have been year-round residents of Ocean City since 2001, she was born and raised in Florida where she fell in love with the performing arts at a very young age.
“I first entertained audiences for the Walt Disney World Company before working in regional theaters throughout Central Florida,” Sara said. “I trained extensively as a high school theater student at the prestigious Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan and continued my training during the summers at Anne Reinking’s Broadway Theater Project in Florida, earning an apprenticeship under the direction of Anne Reinking.”
Sara had the chance to work directly with Ben Vereen, Gwen Verdon, Gregory Hines, Savion Glover, Joel Gray, Tommy Tune, and “so many others” that she calls her Broadway idols.
“I made my debut as Sillabub, a featured singer and dancer, in the Broadway musical ‘CATS’ before joining the North American Tour in 2000,” Sara said. “Once the final curtain closed, my husband and I were married and we settled in Ocean City.”
And soon began her second career in education.
Second Act
Sara earned a bachelor of arts’ degree in literature with a minor in Jewish and Holocaust studies from Stockton University and a master of arts’ degree in library and information science from Rutgers University.
“I am delighted to be the high school librarian and assistant coach of the dance team,” Sara said. “In addition, I have directed and choreographed several past productions for the OCHS Drama Guild.”
This past spring’s OCHS Spring Dance production was themed New York, and the coach asked Sara if she would be willing to sing “Memory” while the students did the choreography.
“So that was really cool because then even more kids heard me sing,” she said.
After answering her life’s calling again, many from her new life as an educator are more than just noticing.
“The cat’s out of the bag,” she said, enjoying the pun, when asked about students and co-workers knowing her musical past on Broadway. “Some of them had no idea of my first career and were totally blown away that I held that little bit of a secret.
“So, yeah, there are some that are very, very surprised.”
And, this “great journey” of a second act, as Sara calls it, appears to be continuing past this summer’s concert.
“Now that I’m comfortably getting back into it,” she responded when asked if more performances are on the horizon, “yes, if, depending on what doors open, I might step through it.”
Stepping onto the stage continues to call her and, thankfully for so many, Sara is answering.