“The Sound of Music” makes its way to the Wakefield stage
Staff Photo by Ashley Masingale
The children cheer after Maria helps them through a thunderstorm.
The Wakefield High School Theater begins its production of the critically acclaimed play, “The Sound of Music” for its 20th anniversary. The play will be showing from Dec. 5-7 and will be charging $10 per person. The theater will be bringing the play back after Wakefield middle school’s last production seven years prior.
The cast of this play is unique, especially since one of the main leads is a freshman. The technical crew is also incorporating underclassmen into their training, which helps the younger kids to better lead and understand roles for future productions.
Maria Hoppough is one of the many underclassmen participating in this production. Hoppough is the stage manager in “The Sound of Music” and her assistant stage manager is Andrew Patterson. Patterson is a senior at Wakefield and has been an assistant stage manager for all four years of high school.
Sophomore Blake Rose and senior Sky Ashforth perform as Rolf and Liesl.
“He’s really good with the technical aspect, like doing lights, sound, and knowing where things are in the shop,” Hoppough said. “I am really social and good at telling people what to do, so he guides me. We have a good, balanced system.”
Sam Coury, Wakefield Freshman is also fortunate enough to be working on “The Sound of Music” team this year. Coury plays one of the lead roles as Captain Von Trapp. Coury has been memorizing lines and practicing his role in his free time.
“It’s definitely surprising as a ninth-grader to get a decent role. There’s not as many males in theater. It’s been stressful but really enjoyable,” Coury said.
Seven years ago, when the first production of “The Sound of Music” ran through Wakefield, Lindsay Jenkins had the opportunity to participate as an elementary school student as Gretl Von Trapp. Now, Lindsay takes on the role of Elsa Schraeder during her senior year.
Children cower from the sounds of thunder.
“He [Paul Orsett] needed some younger kids to play Marta and Gretl. He brought up a few kids from the middle and elementary school and I ended up playing Gretl. I get to see a little mini-me almost,” Jenkins said.
“The Sound of Music” has a timeless quality that brings people together. The play surrounds the historical events of World War II from a different perspective and talks about the importance of music.
Paul Orsett, Wakefield’s theater arts teacher is passionate about what the play stands for.
“It touches base on a lot of things that are happening socially in its time period and we talk a lot on things that are happening in our time period,” Orsett said. “It really deals with multiple concepts from adult to child.”
The curtain opens on Nonberg Abbey.
Wakefield High School also hosted the middle school production of the Wizard of Oz in the high school auditorium. The play showed Nov. 21-23 and involved the high school theater crew as well, although the play was produced through the middle school. The challenge was that there must be a quick change between the sets and involved a very busy few days.
Overall, “The Sound of Music” is a wonderful play that is going to be represented well through Wakefield High School. With its unique cast and dedicated members, Wakefield is in for a play to make their year!
“[the music] is just done so well because these are the musicals in our lifetime that will send you out singing all the songs,” Orsett said.
Junior Naomi Firebaugh portrays Maria Rainer.
