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Community Corner

Wentzville Christian Church presents "The Sound of Music"

The show is top quality entertainment, but also serves as outreach for the church.

 will be alive with The Sound of Music next weekend, and director Tammy Rodenbaugh believes the popular musical offers a perfect blend of secular and religious themes.

"There needs to be some kind of message in there," she said.

Rodenbaugh, a member of Wentzville Christian, has also directed Annie, Godspell, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and Seven Brides For Seven Brothers as church productions. She has found that the shows, performed free for the community, serve as outreach too.

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"We have had people come back to the church–cast members looking for a church home, and some who came back have been audience members," she said.

The show will be performed at 7 p.m. Friday and 2 and 7 p.m. Saturday at the church, 1507 Highway Z. Songs include "The Sound of Music," "The Lonely Goatherd," "My Favorite Things and" "Do-Re-Mi."

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This is the stage version, which differs from the movie. The songs "I Have Confidence" and "Something Good" are not in the stage show, as they were added for the movie. Plus, some of the songs that remain are in different order than they are in the film. But this will still be a stunning experience, with the performers backed by a 19-piece band, Rodenbaugh said.

"We’re very excited," Rodenbaugh said. "We have a very talented group of people, and they’ve worked very hard."

The cast features Kim Bauer of as Maria; Patrick Johnston of St. Charles as Captain Von Trapp; Kathryn Anderson of Wentzville, a freshman at St. Charles Community College, as Liesl; Jimmy Cambron of Wentzville, a senior at , as Friedrich; church member Kara Wolf of Troy as Louisa; Kayla Hutfleff of O’Fallon, a Francis Howell High School student, as Brigitta; Jimmy Coogan of Lake Saint Louis as Kurt; Natalie Irlmeier of O’Fallon, a Fort Zumwalt North Middle School student, as Marta; and Madilyn Moore of Lake Saint Louis at Gretl.

Preparation for the production began around the first of the year by getting permission to license the play. Auditions were held Feb. 13. With 70 people trying out for 34 roles, it was very competitive.

"It was difficult to cast the children, because we had so many talented kids audition," Rodenbaugh said.

The first day of rehearsal was February 20, when the cast members started learning the music and were given the books with the dialogue. The cast rehearsed three days a week, and they had until April 1 to have all the lines memorized. As rehearsal progressed, staging and choreography were added.

"Many times we had three (rehearsal) rooms going at the same time," Rodenbaugh said.

Sets, props, hair and makeup were incorporated as the show dates got closer.

"Each rehearsal they were thrown something new. Each rehearsal is a learning experience. Even at this point," Rodenbaugh said recently, "we’re fine-tuning."

As is typically the case with community theater, the actors are also the stage crew, and they help move sets and props between scenes.

"The scene changes are a dance within themselves," Rodenbaugh said. "Nobody’s bored for long."

Rodenbaugh is thrilled with the quality of the performers.

"They’re phenomenal," she said. "They absolutely blew me away. I told the music director, there’s really not a weak point. In most shows, especially when you’re doing community theater, you’re usually, ‘OK, you’re the best I’ve got. I’m gonna put you in the role.’ It wasn’t like that at all. I mean, they blow me away--they really do. And the kids are so unbelievably talented--the amount of talent packed into them at such young ages is amazing. And it’s been wonderful to watch the seasoned veteran actors teach the young ones. And some of the young ones are more veterans than some of the adults in the cast, so they’re teaching as well."

Robert Gleason, the theater teacher at Holt High School who also has a long affiliation with The Muny, played piano at a recent rehearsal and told the cast, "You’re solid. You’re in great shape."

Help comes from all corners during a volunteer production like this.

"We get a lot of support from the community," Rodenbaugh said. "There is a wonderful sense of family among the theatrical community in St. Charles County and St. Louis. The high school helps us. We use their costumes, and the tech theater kids help build things. We borrowed nun costumes from a theater in Rolla."

A German teacher from Holt High even stopped by to help the cast with pronunciation.

"As we’re reading through (the script), she corrected all of our German, so that we were saying things correctly," Rodenbaugh said. "Because we’re talking (about) people’s names, and historic events, and cities that really exist. I’m kind of a perfectionist, and most people wouldn’t catch it, but I at least wanted to try and get close to the (right) pronunciation."

The cast even took a field trip to the German Cultural Society in St. Louis.

"Their youth group taught our dancers the laendler, the Austrian folk dance," she said.

The cast has really bonded.

"Each cast is close in their own way," she said. "This cast has very much become a family. I mean, the kids call (the actress playing) Maria ‘Mom.’ When little Jimmy (Coogan) was in (a recent production of) ‘Les Mis,’ tons of people from (the cast) went to see him...The support is great."

Rodenbaugh is optimistic that everything will fall into place by opening night.

"There’s a lot of prayer and a lot of work that goes into it," she said. "It starts a little slower, but the last six weeks it’s almost a full-time job, coordinating everything and getting every little detail done. But the end result is we’re able to bring something phenomenal to the community, and we don’t charge for it. So we’re bringing people into a church that they may not go into otherwise. We’re giving a taste of the arts to people who may not be able to afford a ticket to The Fox, or gas to go to The Muny. And we have a great time."

The production runs two hours and 15 minutes, with a 20-minute intermission. For more information, call the church at 636-327-6622.

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