Performers of (almost) all ages encouraged to audition

The most recent Denison Community School District community musical, “Elf,” was performed in 2019.

DCS puts on a community musical once every four years, which means 2023 is the year for the next.

“We’ve been talking about doing “Mary Poppins” for quite a while,” said Denison High School (DHS) language arts teacher Laurel Olsen.

She is directing the production; DHS vocal teacher Kandice Thompson will handle the music.

Second grade students through adults of any age are encouraged to audition for parts in the production.

Olsen said the school had considered “Mary Poppins” four years ago, but the casting options weren’t quite right.

“I always like to have at least several people who are capable of doing the title role; you never know for sure who is going to audition, and for a show that is named after the title role, you want to make sure you have someone good in that part,” Olsen said. “We thought we had more guys trying out than girls four years ago. Now we have a much stronger group of high school girls, so we should have more options for our Mary Poppins.”

The 1964 Disney production is a favorite movie of Olsen’s childhood, which was one of her personal reasons for choosing the play.

“It has a lot of fun music in it and it has a great ensemble cast; there are parts for any age,” she said.

“There are some main roles for children and there are a lot of roles for high schoolers or adults. When you’re doing a community show, you want to have a show that has parts for everybody and is pretty flexible in casting.”

The cast will have a minimum of 35 members, but Olsen expects many more.

“I typically like to cast everyone who tries out, so it depends on how many people show up,” she said. “When we did Schreck, we had close to 100 people in the cast; when we did Elf, it was more like 70 to 80. Most of our high school shows run 45 to 60.”

“Mary Poppins” is a big show with many challenges beyond the cast, Olsen noted.

“There are a lot of different locations in the show and there are a lot of time-period props because it’s set at the turn of the century,” she said. “We’re looking for some not-genuine antiques but things that look like they’re from the turn of the century – like a desk and a sofa.”

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The unique props needed include a classic carpet bag, a parrot-head umbrella and a Victorian-era birdcage.

“Some of those things would be great to get from the community, but I’m not entirely sure we’ll find them just lying around,” Olsen said.

She has been in contact with schools around the state that have recently produced the musical to see if props from those productions might be available or if theater staff at those schools can offer ideas about how to make some of the props.

“A nice thing about theater is you can use your imagination and a lot of repurposing - and duct tape,” Olsen said. “We can usually create most of what we need on stage.”

Lots of people will be needed to manage all the activity on the stage and behind it during the production.

“There is a lot of magic that happens on stage that requires people moving things on stage and people placed in different places on stage to help with some of the technology elements or the real-life magic elements,” she said. “It’s also a very large set and we would appreciate anyone who wants to help on the set-building days.”

Set construction will take place from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on most Saturdays during the fall.

“Anyone who is interested in heading that up or likes to build things would definitely be welcome,” Olsen said. “Costuming is also a really big job. We probably will rent most of the main characters’ costumes, but a lot of the ensemble roles we’ll try to come up with from our own stock.”

The scenes in which Mary Poppins flies will be handled with creative use of the digital projection system at the Denison High School Fine Arts Center (FAC) and some on-stage magic – not by flying the actress on wires.

Rental of a flying system would cost more than $6,000, would fill a lot of the backstage areas needed for the production and would require a lot of training and rehearsal.

A change to the musical production this fall will be use of recorded music instead of a pit orchestra.

“The reason is that a lot of people who are in the pit orchestra are mostly adults,” Olsen said. “We decided it would be nice to open that up during the community musical years so that if those adults want to audition, they don’t have to choose between the two.”

Rehearsal for the pit orchestra is also very demanding.

“They usually start practicing at the end of September and practice at least one to two times a week to get all the music,” she said. “Sometimes on bigger shows there’s a lot of music; two and a half hours of playing, nonstop. A lot of our music people are very busy and we thought we’d give them a break.”

Auditions for Mary Poppins will begin at 7 p.m. on Monday, August 28, at the FAC.

“People who are auditioning for the ensemble can just show up and fill out a form,” Olsen said. “We’ll give them information and do a quick activity to see what they’re interested in. If they want to audition for solo singing parts, then they need to stay longer, read lines and sing by themselves. If they’re an elementary student, we like to have a parent present so they have all the information.”

Performances of “Mary Poppins” will take place on November 3, 4 and 5.

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