http://yankton.net/articles/2012/10/12/river_city/doc50777a6764e75790732151.txt

 

‘Culture’ Hits The Skids In YHS Comedy

‘An Evening Of Culture’ Envisions A Local Theater’s Hilarious Effort To Stage ‘Romeo And Juliet’

By Andrew Atwal
andrew.atwal@yankton.net

When the lights go up on this fall’s Yankton High School (YHS) production next week, it will be the first play that Pam Kallis has directed.

After spending years involved with the design and technical aspects of theater at YHS, she has decided to try her hand at directing this year.

“I have been doing the technical aspect of theater here since 1996. I’ve costumed every single show at YHS since the fall of that year,” Kallis said. “When Bob Beard decided to retire from directing, I thought I’d give it a try.”

Her first production will be a play within a play. “An Evening of Culture” by Mark Landon Smith, produced with special arrangement with Baker’s Plays, is a story that takes place in Mineola County, which is located “in the middle of nowhere” in the South.

“It’s supposed to be about a community theater group from somewhere in the south called the Mineola Society for Cultural Recognition,” Kallis said. “The group is putting on ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and are very enthusiastic and very positive about it, but just are not very good.”

The first act of the play occurs about 30 minutes before the curtain is set to go up on the ‘Romeo and Juliet’ production. However things are not going well. The set is not yet done, there is a dog barking backstage and with the play taking place in a middle school gymnasium, the scoreboard is going off.

“All kinds of things go wrong,” Kallis said. “Things continue to go wrong all throughout the production.”

She said she wanted to do a comedy this year for a number of reasons.

“It’s an election year, so I really wanted to put on a comedy,” Kallis said. “I didn’t want anything serious, I wanted something that would make people laugh.

Kallis added that this is a family show and there is nothing too offensive and nothing too deep, and that there are many jokes that little kids will laugh at during the play.

Students began rehearsing for the play during the first week of September, and have been practicing five or six days a week since then.

“We have had to work around band competitions and things like that, but the kids have been really great and really flexible with everything,” Kallis said.

Tickets for the play are $5 for adults, $4 for students and $3 with a student activities card. The play takes place Oct. 19, 20 and 22 at the Summit Center theater.

“One of the things that really drew me to this show was all the silly things that go on,” Kallis said. “There are really inappropriate costumes for the times. Lady Capulet comes dressed as a southern belle and a nurse is dressed in a really modern costume.”

Kallis said there have been some difficulties with her moving from the technical side of theater to directing.

“I still tend to tech the show in my head as I’m directing,” she said. “With this show I am still putting together my own costumes, though.”

Despite the difficulties she has had with the transition to directing, she said she is thoroughly enjoying her new role.

“It’s all my picture with directing,” Kallis said. “It’s really cool to have it be my vision and my direction. It’s fun to have kids get that ‘a-ha’ moment where they see where I want a scene to go and take it even further.”

Kallis learned that she would be directing the play last spring and she felt this production would be a good opportunity for new students to get into theater, and also had good roles for the students she knew would be involved.

“There were good parts in here that I knew kids would enjoy and had good roles for the kids that I knew I would have and had great opportunities to train new actors in theater,” she said. “I love working with kids and that’s what I love most about theater at the high school level.”

Kallis said there are a number of reasons why people should come out to see the production.

“People should come see this because everyone needs to laugh,” she said. “I really want people to come and laugh. Forget all your troubles and all things that should be done and have to be done and just come laugh. I promise, without a shadow of a doubt, something in this play will make you laugh.”

Kallis added that audience members should get there early because actors will “be doing crazy things” before the show starts.

Cast List:

Student Directors — Bre Schmidt and Abby Slattery

Clint “Buzz” Dean, Master Electrician — Alex Rehurek

Cassie Dean — Cassie Pospishil

Callie Dean — Callie Pospishil

Cammie Dean — Shaianne Shadle

Carrie Dean — Rachel Wood

Lil’ Clint Dean — Sam Carda

Violet Farkle — Kayla Sylvester

Mildred Carson — Amber Livingston

Delbert Fink — Shane Wright

Faye McFaye — Payton Terca

RuthAnn Barns — Gretta Hans

Naomi Carson — Alexa Berg

Luther Carson — Tom Kellen

Junior Carson — Chris Eldred

Bubba Bedford — Paden Schmidt

DD, the Dog — Mitchell Riibe

The girls from Skeeter’s Hay ‘n’ Feed. — Tara Richardson, Alanna Binder, Susie Kinsley, Cebrina Kruse, Jackie Pajl

Norma Dodson, Costumer — Eileen Mullican

Chester — Kevin White

Viola — McKayla Thieman

Capulet Servant — Alikeh Sasse

Technical Production Members — Devin Westerman, Selena Olvera, Kylie Grate, Jeffrey Koller, Iesley Stone

You can follow Andrew Atwal on Twitter at twitter.com/andrewatwal