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More than 60 actors, young and old, make up the cast of Richey Suncoast Theatre's production of The Sound of Music.
By BARBARA L. FREDRICKSEN, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published May 10, 2002
The stage will be alive with the sound of ... people, lots of people, when Richey Suncoast Theatre opens its production of the beloved Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, The Sound of Music, on Thursday.
"We have 60 people in this cast," said Eileen Huntington, producer of the show. The show usually has from 25 to 30 cast members at most.
Besides the eight members of the singing Von Trapp family, their friends, the young postulant Maria and a quartet of nuns that the script calls for, director Rick Bronson added three soldiers, 21 child/puppets and a chorus of 20 nuns.
"One hundred children showed up to audition for the seven children's roles," Mrs. Huntington said. "(Rick) felt so badly he couldn't cast them all, he put the children into a puppet show. The 21 puppets dance on strings the Von Trapp children handle during one scene."
The nuns will double as party guests.
Richey Suncoast newcomer Sadra Bostick will play Maria Rainer, the high-spirited young woman who is asked to leave a Catholic convent in 1938 Austria to become governess to seven children whose mother has died. Ms. Bostick, a second-grade teacher in Clearwater, has performed in other theaters in Brigadoon, Princess Ida, Nunsense and Pirates of Penzance.
The Mother Abbess who asks Maria to reconsider her vocation and Climb Ev'ry Mountain will be played by Davida Petrie, a former voice and music teacher who played in The Mikado and has been in several shows at Stage West Community Playhouse.
Playing the stern Captain Von Trapp, whose heart is eventually won by Maria, is Abbott Morgan, a frequent performer on Tampa Bay area stages. Morgan played Mr. Spettigue in Charley's Aunt at Richey Suncoast and has won two Lary Awards for direction and acting for work at other theaters, including Francis Wilson Playhouse and Carrollwood Players.
The captain's eldest daughter, Liesl, will be played by River Ridge student Gabrielle Mirrabella, who played the lead role of Yum-Yum in the Hernando County Fine Arts Council's The Mikado. Richey Suncoast veteran actor Justin Sargent will play her boyfriend, Rolf, a young German soldier who struggles between loyalty to the Von Trapps and loyalty to his commanding officer.
Other Von Trapp children are Friedrich (Jonathan Tietz), Louisa (Joanna Mallon), Kurt (Louis Ramsey-Wood), Brigitta (Megan Mullen), Marta (Harley Pope) and Gretl (Skylar Bronson).
Making her Richey Suncoast debut as music director is Miriam Wysock, the organist/director at King of Kings Lutheran Church of Port Richey. Her three-piece music ensemble will accompany the familiar Sound of Music songs: My Favorite Things, Do-Re-Mi, Edelweiss, Sixteen Going on Seventeen, and So Long, Farewell. Marie Skelton is choreographer, and Mickey Bronson the costume designer.
WHAT: The Sound of Music
WHERE: Richey Suncoast Theatre, 6237 Grand Blvd., New Port Richey
WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursday and weekends through June 2. Shows at 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2:30 p.m. Sundays.
TICKETS: $12, reserved seating. Box office is open 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays and an hour before each show. Call (727) 842-6777.