Adventure, pirates and buried treasure are making their way to the Montezuma-Cortez High School with the MCHS drama program’s upcoming performance of “Treasure Island.” The show will be held on six occasions, with opening night to be held Friday, March 7 at 7 p.m. in the Ralph E. Vavak Memorial Auditorium.
Following performances will be held on Saturday, March 8 at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.; Friday, March 14 at 7 p.m. and Saturday, March 15 at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.
The play will follow Ken Ludwig’s stage adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s adventure novel, “Treasure Island.” The story follows young Jim Hawkins, played by Tianne Nielson, who strikes out on an journey to find buried treasure after discovering a treasure map. Along the way, Jim meets the cunning Long John Silver, played by Brian Sandner, and other dynamic characters.
Rehearsals for “Treasure Island” have been taking place since the beginning of January, according to MCHS drama program director Nicholaus Sandner. Auditions were held in December, and the cast of about 40 have been working toward their performances ever since.
One of the challenges and exciting aspects of preparing for this play has been found in teaching the students how to emulate the dialects of their characters. And not just one or two dialects. Sandner shares students have been learning six to eight different dialects with the help of a dialect coach.
“We’ve been working really hard on a variety of things,” Sandner said. “This one’s a challenge because we’re working on dialects and getting the characters to speak in an authentic sort of way. We have six or eight different dialects that we’re trying to integrate into the show, from various characters to show the wide range of backgrounds of some of the pirate characters.”
The online dialect coach also helped teach students dialects during a past MCHS production of “Fiddler on the Roof.”
“He has this process that breaks down the key sounds of that dialect and then making what vowel sounds you shift as you move into pronouncing it differently than how you would speak,” Sandner said. “He also records all of the lines from the show in that dialect, so the students can have their own recording that connects with their character and their lines of dialogue. They can practice along with that … it’s a lot of extra work cause, in addition to learning the lines, they’re also having to learn to say them in a unique way.”
Some of the dialects students are learning for this show include three or four different English dialects, Irish, Scottish, Hampshire (the classic pirate accent), proper British and Cockney.
Cast members have also been working tirelessly to prepare for the sword fight and other fight scenes.
“Another thing we’ve been working hard on is the fight scenes,” Sandner said. “We’ve got sword fighting and there’s a gunbattle with Flintlock pistols, and we’re working on a lot of stage combat. We’ve been working with some fencing techniques to keep everybody safe on stage while making it look really exciting too.”
Sander added that one of the students is helping make custom Flintlock pistols that “will actually shoot fire from the barrel.”
“They’ll look like they’re firing on stage using stage-grade pyrotechnics,” Sander said. “It’s exciting too. It’ll really have a lot of pizzazz to it.”
The set will also be different from what the group has done in the past.
“The majority of the time, it is on board a ship,” Sandner said of the set. “We’re working on a mast with a crow’s nest and some climbable cargo nets that the actors can climb up and down. It’ll be really exciting looking. Very different from what we’ve done before.”
Sandner shared students are enjoying getting into their “colorful pirate character” personas and have been learning a lot about nautical terms and the time period the story takes place in.
“The way that people speak is unique, and there’s a lot of words that they don’t necessarily know the definitions of. We’ve been learning about nautical terms and the time period specific references,” Sandner said.
Tickets for adults are $10 and students and senior tickets are $6. Children 5 years old and under can attend for free.
Tickets can be purchased at the door or online at www.mchsdrama.booktix.com.
