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Pipestone Area Schools middle and high school students will perform the play “Faith County” for the com- munity on Saturday, May 11 and Sunday, May 12. Pictured are (front row, l-to-r) Laura Van Iperen, Sophie Olivier, Mia Pilar-Lopez, Violet Dougherty, (back row, l-to-r) Elsa Stogdill, Thomas Leija, Mikah Weets, Savanna Currier and Keegan Otter. Photo by Kyle Kuphal
Pipestone Area Schools (PAS) students will present the play “Faith County” on Saturday, May 11 and Sunday, May 12.
The play is centered on the Faith County Fair. Director Sylvia Newell said there will be a live chicken and rabbit on the stage to help create the fair atmosphere. She described the play as a comedy and said it includes a wedding, a death and southern accents.
Neither Newell nor Activities Director Rick Zollner knew when the school last had a spring play, but they indicated that it had been several years. Newell, a community theater veteran, including with the Calumet Players in Pipestone, also directs the school district’s one act play team and said she’d asked those students if there was a spring play. She was told there wasn’t and that they didn’t have a director. Newell offered her services in hopes of fostering interest in live theater.
“I want them to be Calumet Players someday or whatever town they go to and to enhance somebody else’s community theater,” she said.
Newell said she also believes that it’s important to have theater available, along with athletics and other activities, and that theater can help students develop self confidence.
The cast of nine students in grades seven through 12 started rehearsing “Faith County” in March and has rehearsed four days a week after school since then. There have been some challenges along the way, with some members of the original cast dropping out, others joining and others recruited to fill roles. Through it all, Newell said the cast has been good to work with.
“I’m as pleased as I can be,” Newell said. “It’s all about building a program.”
Newell said her husband, Al VanBemmel, built the set and high school art students painted it. Students will also operate the lights and sound during the play.
Newell said Calumet Players Children’s Theater veteran Collene Landgren is helping with rehearsals, costumes and props, and Band Director Zachary Ploeger provided a keyboard and metronome for use in the play.
The cast will perform the play for their fellow students on Friday, May 10 at 1 p.m., and for the general public on Saturday, May 11 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, May 12 at 2 p.m. The play will be in the PAS Auditorium and there will be no charge to attend.
