Recent History – 2001
Jan. 3, 2000
DAWSON CREEK — For most students at South Peace Secondary School (SPSS), the holiday season means two weeks off.
Not so for those in the SPSS major theatre class. Starting Tuesday, they’ve committed to a schedule of rehearsing for five hours each day in the run-up to their presentation of the Rogers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific.
“This is the time people give up the rest of their lives,” said Fred Klem, SPSS teacher and the show’s director.
South Pacific was chosen, he said, because of the good music but also because it’s about sailors and nurses who are not much older than the students in the production.
“They were maybe five years older, so I thought these are characters that they could identify with. They could convince us that that’s who they are.”
As the title indicates, the show is set on a tropical island in the South Pacific during the Second World War — an exotic world of natives, sailors, nurses, and at least one French plantation owner.
The main cast consists of Joanna Gorton as Nellie Forbush, Ian Mooney as Emile Debeck, Lindsay Molson as Liat, Miguel Eichelberger as Cable, Torunn Landsgaard as Bloody Mary and Dean Nelson as Captain Brackett.
Molson is also in charge of choreography. With help from Kasey Scott and Tatiana Dobrowolski, they’ve developed some dances largely from scratch. As well, Monica Dobrowolski was brought in to help with the Polynesian dancing.
About 50 students are involved in the production. And an orchestra made up of musicians from the community will supply the music.
Well into their first day of practice, the students were upbeat.
“I remember the rehearsals last year were a lot of fun, because you get to hang around with all your friends and do a lot of theatry stuff,” Mooney said.
South Pacific will be performed Jan. 18-20, 8 p.m. start, at Unchagah Hall. Tickets, which are $10 each, are available at the Dawson Creek Art Gallery, Simple Pleasures, and Shoppers Drug Mart, as well as at the door.