NTP’s ‘The Little Mermaid’ Ready To Be ‘Part Of Your World’

Before Disney chose Halle Bailey to play the role of Ariel in the live-action version of “The Little Mermaid,” Patty Smithey of Land O’Lakes (above) had already been chosen for the same role in the New Tampa Players’ production, which opens tonight.

When Disney announced recently that Halle Bailey, a teenage African-American actress, was going to play the lead role as Ariel in the live-action remake of  “The Little Mermaid,” Patty Smithey thought that was really cool.

The idea, she figured, made perfect sense. And why wouldn’t she? After all, before Disney chose Halle Bailey, the New Tampa Players chose Patty Smithey.

An African-American actress herself, Smithey has been working hard to perfect the role of Ariel, which she was selected to play in the upcoming New Tampa Players (NTP) production of the 1989 Disney animated blockbuster.

The show opens tonight at 8 p.m. at the University Area Community Development Center (CDC) at 14013 N. 22nd St. in Tampa. There are two showings on Saturday, one on Sunday, and then showings the weekend of August 2-4.

For the past month, Smithey, who lives in Land O’Lakes, has been rehearsing with the rest of the NTP, a local acting troupe, at the CDC.

An acting hopeful in middle and high school, Smithey set aside her thespian dreams when she went off to college at Florida State University in Tallahassee.

Smithey earned a degree at FSU in International Affairs, studying abroad in places like Panama, Prague, Poland and Croatia, as she focused on human rights. 

The acting bug, however, never went away. And, at the age of 25, Smithey is returning to her first love.

“It’s my big comeback,” Smithey says, with a chuckle. “I definitely feel honored I was chosen for this role.”

When she auditioned in May, she considered herself a longshot for any role. “The Little Mermaid” wasn’t exactly a movie rich with non-white characters.

On the paperwork for NTP, she put down a number of roles she felt suited to play, like Ursula, or one of Ariel’s sisters, or, she jokes, “maybe a fish in the background.”

She also, on a whim, wrote down Ariel.

Nora Paine, the president of NTP, says the troupe didn’t go into the audition process looking for a white actress to play the role of Ariel. She says that is never part of the process. “We looked for the person who could best embody the character,” Paine says. “For Ariel, we were looking for that innocence, a teenage kind of spunk, for lack of a better word.”

Because the movie revolves around a mermaid’s yearning to explore a new, forbidden world, the role had to be filled by someone who embodied Ariel’s way of looking at that world with total awe. 

“Patty had the facial expression of Ariel, the innocent and the curious face,” Paine says. “She did really, really well.”

Not to mention the voice. Smithey took on the movie’s iconic ballad, “Part of Your World,” for her audition, considered one of the best Disney songs ever, and nailed it. 

The role of Ariel was filled by someone who had the complete package that director Derek Baxter, choreographer Anne Tully, musical director G. Frank Meekins and Paine were looking for all along.

“I knew I could sing,” Smithey says. “But, when I got that call, wow, it was just amazing.”

Smithey’s enthusiasm for her role, and the significance of being a black Ariel, has not been tempered by some of the backlash Disney has received in social media for also picking an African-American for the role.

There have been hurtful memes passed around, and the hashtag #NotMyAriel actually trended on Twitter.

“I saw some of that on social media, and I was shocked,” Smithey said. “I mean, where are these people coming from, that they would be that upset about this mythical creature (being played by a black woman). Some of the stuff I saw was very negative.”

Smithey hasn’t received any backlash, and instead prefers to think of it as inspired and inclusive casting by Paine and the NTP.

The controversy over Disney’s decision has been noticed by Paine as well. While she admits that NTP may have smiled a bit when Disney made the same decision NTP did while casting, she says the debate over inclusivity in theater is a good one. She said diversity was a strong theme in many of the speeches at this year’s Tony Awards as well.

“We’re really glad it can be a national conversation, and a local one as well,” Paine says.

She says the NTP has always strived for inclusivity, no matter the production, no matter the role. The troupe has hosted productions like the Penguin Project, which provided opportunities for those with special needs, and inserted a host of actors into non-traditional parts for other productions.

In 2016, NTP reached out to residents in the University Area, where most of the troupe’s productions are performed — until their new home in New Tampa is completed — and asked them what they wanted to see. Residents in the area, which has a large African-American population, told the NTP they would love for their children to come to productions that had actors that looked like they do.

In 2017, NTP heeded that advice and did a production of the “The Wiz”, which re-imagines “The Wizard of Oz” with a primarily African-American cast.

Choosing Smithey was nothing out of the ordinary for NTP.

“ I think it’s great how they are modernizing the role,” Smithey said. “Maybe other little girls and little boys can see that anyone can be a princess or a prince.”

Smithey will lead 52 other castmates in what will be one of NTP’s biggest productions yet.

NTP is bringing in a choreographer from the Shinobi School in Temple Terrace, which focuses on acrobatic performances relating to parkour (movements used in military obstacle course training), ninja warriors and the circus arts.

“It’s going to add a circus twist to Disney,” Paine says.

Long pieces of silk cloth will hang from above to provide the illusion of being underwater, with performers artfully working their way around the silky streams.

“This is new, as far as I can tell, combining a traditional Broadway musical and circus arts done by a non-professional company,” Paine says.

“The Little Mermaid” opens Friday, July 26, at 8 p.m. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit NewTampaPlayers.org.

Kinnan /Mansfield May Be Connected, But Only For Emergencies

This is the view from the end of Kinnan St., which runs north from Cross Creek Blvd. Mansfield Blvd. in Meadow Pointe is on the other side of the barrier, about 40 feet away. (Photo: John C. Cotey)

The decades-old debate over connecting Kinnan St. in New Tampa to Mansfield Blvd. in Wesley Chapel appears to have, pardon the pun, reached the end of the road.

After years of meetings and studies and community activism, the Pasco Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) sided with the Meadow Pointe residents who claim that connecting the roads would put their children’s safety at risk.

On June 11, the Pasco MPO voted unanimously to forward their recommendation to the Board of County Commissioners that Wesley Chapel be connected to New Tampa’s growing K-Bar Ranch community via two roads further to the east of Kinnan-Mansfield (neither has been completed) — Meadow Pointe Blvd. and Wyndfields Blvd., both of which would eventually connect to K-Bar Ranch Blvd. (at different locations).

But, Mansfield Blvd. and Kinnan St. will not be connected for area commuters.

“Everybody that came today spoke against opening up Kinnan and Mansfield,” said Pasco District 2 Commissioner Mike Moore, who represents the Meadow Pointe area, at the June 11 Pasco MPO meeting. “There was one person who was in favor of it, and he lives in New Tampa.”

Hunter’s Green resident Dr. Jim Davison was the person who spoke in favor of connecting Kinnan-Mansfield.

The final vote to settle the roadways question was expected to be held In August, in Dade City.

Considering that all five members on the Pasco BOC also are on the MPO Board that voted unanimously in favor of making only two of the three connections that were considered, it is almost certain to pass.

Hillsborough County District 2 commissioner Ken Hagan and District 7 Tampa City Councilman Luis Viera, both of whom have fought for the connection for years, expressed disappointment and frustration over the Pasco MPO’s decision.

Hagan called it “extremely parochial and irrational.”

However, both New Tampa representatives took some solace in the fact that the famed 40-foot patch of dirt, weeds and trees (and often, garbage and abandoned furniture) separating the roads may be paved over, connecting the roads for use by emergency service vehicles — with a mechanical traffic arm keeping local traffic out — as well as providing a path for bikers and pedestrians.

Public safety was one of the primary reasons both Hagan and Viera had fought for the connection.

“I’m pleased that Pasco County is finally recognizing the significant public safety concerns with Kinnan-Mansfield remaining closed,” Hagan said. “I think this is a necessary first step, and we will live to fight another day.”

Davison was less pleased with the concession for emergency vehicle access. A longtime traffic activist and emergency room physician, Davison said that most people come to the hospital emergency room by private vehicle, not an ambulance, and those people will still face a longer trip to get care.

“Connecting Kinnan and Mansfield is in the public good,” Dr. Davison said.

After years of political arguments and one costly study, Pasco’s MPO turned to its residents to help render a decision.

The MPO was presented with the results from its recent online Pasco Resident Survey, which asked which of four options for connecting Meadow Pointe to New Tampa were preferred.

Meghan McKinney of the consulting firm AECOM, which conducted the initial Wesley Chapel Roadway Connections study which produced the choices for the online survey, said the total number of eligible respondents was 1,180.

The option most favored by those polled online was Option 2, which asked if respondents favored connecting only Meadow Pointe Blvd. to K-Bar Ranch Pkwy. 

Nearly 68 percent responded yes, with 32 percent saying no.

The MPO, however, voted unanimously to forward the second-most popular option, Option 3 — connecting both the Meadow Pointe Blvd. Extension and Wyndfields Blvd. to K-Bar Ranch Pkwy. — which 66 percent favored.

Connecting only Kinnan-Mansfield was never an option — nor was it an option that was studied in the year-long Roadways Connections Study commissioned by the county — but the controversial connection was included with the other roads in both Option 1 and Option 4. Option 1, which asked if residents would be in favor of connecting Kinnan to Mansfield as well as the Meadow Pointe Blvd. Extension to K-Bar Ranch Pkwy., received a “yes” vote by 54 percent of respondents. 

The least popular option from the survey results was No. 4, which would have connected Mansfield Blvd., the Meadow Pointe Blvd. Extension and Wyndfields Blvd. — in other words, all three potential connections to the New Tampa area. Even so, a majority of those responding, 52 percent, still voted in favor of that option as well.

Dr. Valerie Mainguy, a Meadow Pointe resident who works at St. Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church on Cross Creek Blvd., suggested that those numbers were tainted. She told the board she was privy to a “huge initiative” by New Tampa residents to use Pasco addresses and names to skew the results to get Kinnan-Mansfield connected

She said the “fraud” that happened is well known and public knowledge, although she offered no proof of it.

A majority of those saying no to any connections involving Mansfield Blvd. came from those who live along the road. They were signified by red dots on a map showing where the respondents resided.

“The ones that would utilize that connection don’t want that connection,” Moore said.

Those who showed up to the MPO meeting spoke against adding any more traffic to Mansfield Blvd.

“I’m a red dot because I’m the father of two boys that ride their bikes up and down (Mansfield) every day to go to school,” said Meadow Pointe II resident Brad Jorgensen.

Like many of those opposed to connecting Kinnan St. to Mansfield Blvd., Jorgensen cited the safety of children in the neighborhoods along the road.

“This is about not turning our neighborhood into alternate Bruce B. Downs,” Jorgensen said.

Fresh Kitchen Coming To Hunter’s Lake!

While it may be a lot to ask for the new Village at Hunter’s Lake project to single-handedly save the sleepy restaurant scene in New Tampa, it sure seems like the developers are trying.

Fresh Kitchen, a south Tampa favorite with locations on S. Howard Ave. and W. Kennedy Blvd., is the latest restaurant to be announced as coming to the new development on Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd., right across New Tampa’s main thoroughfare from the entrance to Hunter’s Green.

Regency Centers senior leasing agent Marc Elias broke the news to a collection of local business leaders last month at the North Tampa Bay Chamber of Commerce (NTBC)’s Economic Development Briefing at Hunter’s Green Country Club on June.

Fresh Kitchen is owned by the Ciccio Restaurant Group, which also owns such notable restaurants as Taco Dirty, Green Lemon, betterBYRD and Ciccio Cali, which has a popular location in Tampa Palms.

Like Ciccio Cali, Fresh Kitchen focuses on healthy bowls, where patrons choose their base, protein, vegetable and any extras. Elias’ announcement drew a round of positive chatter during the NTBC briefing.

Elias also said that Regency Centers has a BBQ concept coming, as well as a sub-and-wrap concept, although he didn’t name those restaurants.

Regency Centers senior leasing agent Marc Elias.

Along with the previously announced Via Italia Wood Fired Pizza, Poke Island Plus and Grain & Berry, that would mean six new restaurants (plus Starbucks) could be open by April of 2020 in New Tampa.

The Village at Hunter’s Lake also is likely to provide a boost to the social scene in New Tampa.

“We certainly hope so,” said Elias. “We feel like we are responding to the needs of the area, which is really convenience. Hopefully, we’re able to attract the foot traffic over there, and they can hang out with their dogs at the dog parks, go to Starbucks, take a yoga class. That’s the goal, getting them to hang out at the center.”

While Sprouts, the first green grocer to enter the New Tampa market, is the anchor of the retail strip, other occupants previously reported by the Neighborhood News are Banfield Pet Hospital, The Coder School, Hair Cuttery, Heartland Dental, Nationwide Vision Center, Pink & White Nails, Pure Beauty Salon and T-Mobile.

Elias added that a running store and a “yoga concept” also have signed leases.

Elias says the shell buildings should be completed by November, barring a persistent rainy season. Tenants can open  whenever they are ready, though Elias suspects that most will open sometime around April 2020, when Sprouts is expected to be completed.

The Village at Hunter’s Lake will have a total of 71,397 sq. ft. of commercial space. The project also will include a 30,000-sq.-ft. New Tampa Cultural Center — which is expected to break ground next year and open sometime in 2021 — two dog parks and a four-story, 241-unit multi-family complex to be called The Haven at Hunter’s Lake

Sidewalks Awaiting Repairs In Some New Tampa Neighborhoods

Some of the sidewalks in Magnolia Trace and Pinehurst (top right) are in need of repair, but Hillsborough County has a long backlog for sidewalk repairs. (Photos: John C. Cotey)

Dozens of orange safety cones and swatches of bright orange paint have been placed along sidewalks in at least two New Tampa neighborhoods, there as a warning — to watch your step.

Due to uneven sidewalks caused primarily by the roots of large oak trees planted years ago between the sidewalk and the road, those out for a walk or bike ride in the Magnolia Trace and Pinehurst communities off Brookron Dr. in Cross Creek are being cautioned, due to concerns raised by the homeowner’s association’s insurance company during an inspection.

How long will the orange cones adorn the neighborhood’s sidewalks?

That’s anyone’s guess.

Jo-Ann Pilawski of Pilawski Property Management, which manages the Cross Creek II Master Association, notified Hillsborough County’s Public Works department about the sidewalks, which indicated in an email that “a work request has been initiated and assigned to the West Service Unit for inspection, review, and response.”

The email stated an inventory of potential repairs will be conducted within a month, and afterwards, the county will “grind” all identified areas where the lift is less than two inches.

The areas raised more than two inches — and there are quite a few in both neighborhoods — “will be flagged with reflective tape and added to the county’s current backlog of sidewalk replacement requests.”

That backlog, according to Hannah Titrington, the program coordinator of the customer resolution unit at the county, who wrote the email to Pilawski, is approximately 24-36 months.

Prior to 2018, the county had minimal funding for sidewalk repairs, Titrington wrote, causing the backlog. But, in 2018, the Board of County Commissioners committed significantly more money to sidewalk repair after passing a 10-year, $800-million plan for transportation improvements.

“It’s a big county, so you can imagine how many sidewalks there are that need repairs,” Pilawski said. “Unfortunately, unless the association pays for repairs, we’re stuck. A few residents have called to complain, but as soon as I tell them it might make (their) fees go up, no one is interested anymore.”

Pilawski also said that doing so would also set a bad precedent, considering that the sidewalks are supposed to be maintained by the county.

Titrington did write that while the county is working on older requests first, repairs are grouped by proximity. So, an older request from a different area in New Tampa could expedite Pilawski’s request for repairs.

Fr. David Says Goodbye

It was his last mass, but it felt like his first one.

The pews at St. Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church were filled. Everyone was eager to hear what he was going to say. And, the nerves and emotions were almost overwhelming.

“It was pulling me in all kinds of different directions,’’ Father David DeJulio said.

After 16 years of leading St. Mark’s through massive growth and the construction of a new church, making hundreds of friends in the community and helping even more families, Fr. David said goodbye on June 30 to a congregation that has grown from 2,100 families when he came to the church to more than 3,800 as he departs.

He was pleased with his homily, which challenged parishioners to hold steady as they follow Christ, despite the ever-growing plague of distractions. Towards the end of the eucharist prayer, as the end of his time at St. Mark’s drew nearer, he started fighting back those emotions.

Tampa City Council member Luis Viera presented Fr. David with a city commendation, leading to a rousing 45-second standing ovation. When Fr. David tried to bring the mass to a close, his staff 

interrupted him and presented him with a plaque.

“I lost it there at the end,” Fr. David confessed. 

After gathering himself, he followed a procession of altar boys and deacons and, for the last time as their priest, walked past rows of the adoring St. Mark congregants for the final time.

”I’m not really thrilled about leaving,” Fr. David said afterwards, “but when God tells you you gotta go, you gotta go.”

He is headed north (but not too far) to St. Frances Xavier of Cabrini in Spring Hill, only 15 minutes from where his twin brother Frankie’s family lives.

Fr. David will essentially trade parishes with Rev. Richard Jankowski, who has been at St. Frances of Cabrini for 13 years.

It’s the next stop on Fr. David’s journey, which began at the age of 5, when he says he first knew the church is where he wanted to be.

It wasn’t until he was 27, however, that he entered the seminary. He graduated with a finance degree from the University of South Florida, making the long drive to classes from his family’s home in Holiday, FL.

He took a job at a bank in St. Petersburg, a job he said he truly enjoyed. But, that feeling he got in church as a kid never went away.

“It kept haunting me,” he says.

His first year in the seminary, he wasn’t so sure he made the right choice. He thought about quitting after one semester. He had been living with his girlfriend in an apartment in St. Petersburg and was in control of his life. But, when he entered the seminary, he wasn’t.

“My first year was tough,” he says. “I just really didn’t like it.”

He knew he had faith, but wondered what kind. In the end, it turned out to be a determined, resilient and unbending faith, the same kind of faith he implores his parishioners to strive for every day.

It is Fr. David’s style, which is described as easy-going, funny but still somewhat stern, that made him a popular fixture in New Tampa.

Among the first families he met when he came to St. Mark’s were Richard and Nancy Larson. Nancy was the liturgist at St. Mark’s, and Frankie contacted her about planning a party for the installation of his brother, the new priest.

The party was held at Hunter’s Green Country Club, in the community where Fr. David has lived in a home the church uses as its rectory.

Richard and Fr. David became instant friends, as did dozens of others from Hunter’s Green who joined Fr. David’s Bible study group that would meet weekly at his home. Fr. David would teach, and afterwards, there would be wine and food and cigars.

“He built my faith and he made me a much stronger person,” Richard says. “He did that to our whole group.”

Many, Richard says, weren’t even members at St. Mark’s, but Fr. David still brought them home, too.

“He was so good at evangelizing and bringing people back to the church,” Richard says. “He was just a regular guy. I think that appealed to a lot of people.”

Fr. David golfed with the group — he says his handicap is currently a 13 — and the more time he spent with those who had stopped going to church, the more those people started going again.

When they found out Fr. David was leaving, the group pitched in and bought him a membership to Southern Hills Plantation in Brooksville, 10 miles from his new church, so he could continue to spread God’s word to new friends while working on that handicap. 

After Fr. David’s final mass Sunday, he was greeted in the courtyard by Noel and Nellie Negron, whose eyes welled with tears as they thanked their longtime priest for bringing them back into the church.

Noel has been a member for 23 years, but hasn’t always been a regular churchgoer.

“I went when I felt like it,” he said. “When I met Fr. David, he brought me back. (Now) there isn’t a Sunday I miss. I love coming to church.”

Nellie recalled a story about the time her granddaughter Olivia saw Fr. David walking alone across the field next to the church, and asked if that was Jesus.

“I will always remember that story,” she said, smiling. “I love him. I am going to miss him.”

The Negrons have already been to his new church, and plan on stopping in for a mass here and there.

Richard says he will do the same, as, he suspects, many others who knew Fr. David also will do. He joked that he will definitely see Fr. David again, “because I made him promise he would do my funeral.”

Priests usually serve 12 years at one church, but Father David was given 16, so he could spend some time enjoying the church he helped to build.

Fr. David was named pastor at St. Mark’s in 2003, preaching from the Family Life Center the church flock was quickly outgrowing. He envisioned a spiritual center for New Tampa, a place for families to come together in prayer. A fund-raising campaign was started, and the although the economic downturn in 2008 forced a delay, on June 6, 2015, the $10.1-million, 35,000-sq.-ft. sanctuary was dedicated. 

Today, the church is only $1.5 million from paying off a $5-million loan to finish it.

“It’s kind of a slip of the tongue to say it’s “my place,” but I feel connected here,” Fr. David says proudly. I spent half my priesthood here. It’s always going to have a special place in my heart, wherever I am.”

Father David will always be remembered for his stewardship over the sanctuary project, which he credits as a testament to the “tremendous sacrifices on the part of parishioners.”

But, it’s just a small part of the legacy he hopes he leaves behind.

“Obviously buildings are important, but what happened here is we created a place with a story,” he says.

He says he wants to be remembered not only for helping create a beautiful structure to worship in, but also for what has happened inside it. He is proud that St. Mark has been a place where families feel welcome, where you’re greeted by four or five people before you even got to your seat, where he challenged his parishioners’ faith and helped guide them through both happy and difficult times.

He fostered a community that did many good things, a community that he helped connect to God through his teachings.

At the end of the day, and 16 wonderful years, it was all that he could ask.

“I started to think about him not being here, and it was a very emotional thing,” Noel said. “When you have someone you can turn to for some encouragement and leadership and someone to guide us…and now he won’t be here. He was a good shepherd for us.”