July 9, 2025 By Roy Harris
A terrific Hingham Civic Music Theatre production of the Cole Porter hit “Anything Goes” opens Friday and Saturday, Aug. 1 and 2, at Hingham Town Hall’s Sanborn Auditorium.
The show—featuring numbers like “You’re the Top,” “I Get a Kick Out of You” and “It’s Delovely,” in addition to the familiar title song—has a cast of more than two dozen South Shore actors, singers and dancers.
The curtain goes up for both opening-weekend shows at 7:30 p.m. For the second weekend, a Saturday, Aug. 9, show starts at 7:30, with a Sunday 2 p.m. matinee ending the “Anything Goes” run.
The madcap story, which takes place on an ocean liner cruising from New York to London, tells of stowaway Billy Crocker, who is in love with an heiress named Hope Harcourt. But she has fallen for an English lord, also onboard. So two Crocker compatriots, nightclub singer Reno Sweeney and “Moonface” Martin, who is listed as “public enemy No. 13,” do their best to make sure Billy and Hope get together.
Hingham’s Alexa Hartman plays Hope, with Quincy’s Justin Maloney in the role of Billy, who is stowing away on the ship. James A. Sullivan is Moonface, with Kelly Geraghty playing Reno.
“Anything Goes” director Nathan Fogg says he and his artistic team of Samantha Brior Jones Sullivan and Kelley Depasqua have loved getting together a show that’s “full of toe-tapping tunes and classic songs and witty lyrics.” All together, they make it ”a cornerstone of American musical theater,” Fogg says. He adds, “We think it is important to expose our wonderful community theater actors to different styles,” and offer “a variety of entertainment to the HCMT audiences.” And this show, he adds, “is a farcical ocean-crossing romp in its most original available form.”
The 1934 classic has a book by Guy Bolton, P.G. Wodehouse, Howard Lindsay and Russell Crouse, to go with the Porter’s music.
HCMT’s most recent show, in April, “Kiss Me Kate”—another Broadway hit with Cole Porter songs—won audience raves.
The town hall auditorium is at 210 Central St. in Hingham. Tickets are $25 for adults and $20 for seniors and students, and can be purchased in advance at hcmttickets.ludus.com/index.php, or by calling HCMT at 339-793-1821.
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Roy Harris, a semi-retired journalist and long-time HCMT performer, lives in the World’s End area of Hingham.