COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10, 2019 | 7A
Very Little Theater’s ‘Hello, Dolly!’
continues this weekend
COURTESY PHOTO
Kids helping kids
thanks to ‘Pride’
Cottage Grove
teens raise
thousands of
dollars to help
babies, and
young patients
at RiverBend
Th e curtain will rise soon
for Cottage Grove High
School’s annual Lion Pride
Pageant, a popular and
much-anticipated fundraiser
for Children’s Miracle Net-
work. For months, students
have been practicing their
opening dance number and
skits for Lion Pride Pageant
— Th e Musical, which will
open at 7 p.m. on Saturday,
April 27.
“It’s hilarious,” said Lorri
Hanson, the pageant’s co-ad-
visor. And touching, too, she
added, noting the segment of
the show when contestants
appear with their parents.
Over the past 23 years,
Cottage Grove High School
students have raised more
than $300,000 for Children’s
Miracle Network.
Children’s Miracle Net-
work is a program of the
PeaceHealth Sacred Heart
Medical Center Founda-
tion. It helps fund services
and treatments for sick and
injured children at Peace-
Health Sacred Heart Medi-
cal Center at RiverBend in
Springfi eld. All funds raised
by the pageants are donat-
ed to Children’s Miracle
Network, which then gives
10 percent of the proceeds
back to each school for stu-
dent-health programs.
Cottage Grove is among
16 area high schools partic-
You Can Count on Us!
ipating in the Foundation’s
Kids Helping Kids program,
which includes a tour of Riv-
erBend’s pediatrics fl oor and
neonatal intensive care unit.
Students in the program have
raised $6.3 million for Chil-
dren’s Miracle Network since
the fi rst pageant was staged
in the 1992-1993 school year.
“Kids Helping Kids, a
group of enthusiastic, com-
passionate teens, is the sin-
gle-largest donor to our local
Children’s Miracle Network,”
said Alexa Sharps, the Foun-
dation’s pediatric program
director of development.
“Th e money they raise en-
ables babies and kids in our
region to get specialized
treatment and services clos-
er to home at RiverBend,
instead of having to travel to
Portland or San Francisco.”
Th e Very Little Th eatre
continues its landmark 90th
season with one of Broad-
way’s classic musicals, “Hel-
lo, Dolly!” With lyrics and
music by Jerry Herman and
the book by Michael Stewart,
the musical follows the story of
Dolly Gallagher Levi, a strong-
willed matchmaker, as she
travels to Yonkers, New York,
to fi nd a match for the miserly,
well-known, unmarried, half-
a-millionaire Horace Van-
dergelder. In doing so she
persuades his niece, his niece’s
intended, and Horace’s two
clerks to travel to New York City
and fi nd romance.
“Hello, Dolly!” was fi rst
produced on Broadway in
1964, winning 10 Tony Awards,
including Best Musical. Th is set
a record, which the musical held
for 37 years. Th e show’s Original
Cast album was inducted into
the Grammy Hall of Fame in
2002. Th e show has become one
Oregon’s Poet Laureate, Kim
Staff ord, will visit Cottage Grove
April 16 for a day of speaking,
reading and discussion with the
town’s youth, writers and lovers
of literature.
Staff ord was named the
state’s ninth poet laureate by
Gov. Kate Brown in 2018, a
role which fosters the art of
poetry, encourages literacy
and learning, addresses central
issues relating to humanities
and heritage, and refl ects on
public life in Oregon.
“Poetry is our native
language,” he said. “We begin
with imaginative experiments as
children, and lyric language can
be a realm of delight throughout
life. For adults and communities,
poetry can help us be more
open to new ideas, emotionally
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informed, and buoyant in
responding to challenges. In a
society of diverse backgrounds
and perspectives, poetry builds
community.”
Staff ord was born and grew
up in Oregon. He is the author
of a dozen books of poetry and
prose and edited half a dozen
others. His book, “Having
Everything Right: Essays
of Place,” won a citation for
excellence from the Western
States Book Awards in 1986.
Staff ord has received creative
writing fellowships from the
National Endowment for the
Arts, a Governor’s Arts Award,
and the Steward Holbrook
Award from Literary Arts for
his contributions to Oregon’s
literary culture. His work also
has been featured on National
Public Radio.
Staff ord holds a Ph.D.
in medieval literature from
the University of Oregon,
and has worked as a printer,
photographer, oral historian,
editor and visiting writer at a
host of colleges and schools, and
also off ered writing workshops
in Italy, Scotland and Bhutan.
He lives in Portland, Oregon,
with his wife and children.
Staff ord’s itinerary in Cottage
Grove will include meeting with
high school students from 9 to
11 a.m., a no-host writers’ group
lunch at the Brew Station from
11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., a visit to
London School from 1:30 to
2:30 p.m., and fi nally a reading
from his work at 7 p.m. at First
Presbyterian Church.
‘Sound of Music’ continues at Cottage Theatre this weekend
C
COURTESY PHOTO
541-942-0456
ua Sayre, Matt Arscott, Sasha
Berenstein, Timothy Bouwhuis,
Darcy Rust, Mandy Conforth,
Tessa Donangaphaivong, Am-
ber Hagen, Colleen Gaskill,
Hailey Eckhart, Lois Stark and
Laura Gage-Hunt.
Music director is Chris Holt,
with Keri Davis serving as vocal
director. Set design is by Mi-
chael Walker and costume de-
sign is by Nancy Boyett.
Performances, which began
March 29, continue this Th urs-
day through Saturday, April
11-13. Curtain time is 7:30 p.m.
(except for the 2 p.m. Sunday
matinées.) Adult tickets are $25;
seniors and students are $21;
Th ursday performances are $21
for everyone.
Tickets are available through
the Box Offi ce from 1:30 p.m. to
5:30 p.m., Wednesday through
Saturday, by calling 541-344-
7751 or online at Th eVLT.com.
Poet Laureate reschedules visit to CG
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of the most enduring musical
theater hits, with four Broadway
revivals and international
success. It was also made into
the 1969 fi lm, which won three
Academy Awards.
VLT director Gerald Walters
says “’Hello, Dolly!’ is a family
friendly musical that will keep
an audience laughing and enter-
tained from beginning to end.”
Th e VLT production fea-
tures: Sue Schroeder-White as
Dolly Gallagher Levi; Michael
P. Watkins as Horace Van-
dergelder; Cody Mendonca
as Cornelius Hackl; Sheldon
Hall as Barnaby Tucker; Josie
Th omas as Irene Molly; Kenady
Conforth as Minnie Fay; Lily
LaChapelle as Ermengarde;
Chad Lowe as Ambrose Kem-
per; Becky Major Hope as Er-
nestina Money; and Michael
Walker as Rudolph Reisen-
weber. Th e ensemble cast in-
cludes: Rob Roberts, Donovon
Seitzinger, Jim Arscott, Josh-
Cast members portraying the von Trapp family in The
Sound of Music
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ottage Theatre’s spring
musical this year is The
Sound of Music, the in-
spirational story of Maria von
Trapp. Winner of the 1959 Tony
Award for Best Musical, The
Sound of Music features music
by Richard Rodgers and lyrics
by Oscar Hammerstein II. The
book, by Howard Lindsay and
Russel Crouse, is inspired by The
Trapp Family Singers by Ma-
ria Augusta Trapp. This iconic
musical will be onstage for four
weekends at Cottage Theatre be-
ginning Friday, April 5.
The story behind The Sound
of Music is well-known thanks
to the 1965 movie version star-
ring Julie Andrews. In 1930s
Austria, a troublesome postu-
lant named Maria proves too
high-spirited for the discipline of
religious life, so the Mother Ab-
bess sends her away to care for
the children of a widowed naval
Captain. As Maria’s world turns
upside down, she rises to the
challenge of befriending the sev-
en youngsters, who have driven
away countless prior governess-
es. Maria’s generosity of spirit
and her love of music gradually
win the children’s, and even-
tually the Captain’s, affections.
When Austria is invaded by the
Nazis, the family flees over the
mountains to Switzerland, pro-
viding the thrilling finale to this
inspirational story.
Cottage Theatre’s production
of The Sound of Music is di-
Cottage Grove
200 Gateway Blvd.
Cottage Grove, OR 97424
4
(541) 942-5400
Mon. - Sat. 8am - 9pm
Sun. 9am - 8pm
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SAVE 40-70%
ON GROCERIES.
BEAUTIFUL, HUH?
rected by Joel Ibáñez, with mu-
sic direction by Chris King and
choregraphy by Janet Rust. Cos-
tume design is by Rhonda Turn-
quist, set design by Tony Rust,
and lighting design by Amanda
Ferguson. The production stars
Sabrina Gross as Maria and Na-
than Blakely as Captain Georg
von Trapp. The seven von Trapp
children are played by Hanna
Foshay (Liesl), Maia Wilhour
(Friedrich), Kira Carver (Lou-
isa), Nicole Wilhour (Brigitta),
William Blakely (Kurt), Aud-
riahna Jones (Marta), and Zoe
Goings (Gretl). Other featured
actors include Tracy Nygard
(Mother Abbess), Brittany Drei-
er (Elsa Schraeder), Blake Nel-
son (Max Detweiler), and Oshen
Parris-Austin (Rolf).
The Sound of Music runs
for four weekends at Cottage
Theatre from April 5-28. Per-
formances are Thursday, Friday
and Saturday evenings at 8 p.m.,
and Sunday afternoons at 2:30
p.m. There is no performance
on Easter Sunday, April 21.
Tickets are available online
at www.cottagetheatre.org, by
phone at 541-942-8001, or in
person at the Cottage Theatre
Box Office, 700 Village Drive,
Cottage Grove. Tickets are $25
for adults and $15 for youth
(age 6-18). Box Office hours are
Wednesday through Friday, 10
a.m. to 2 p.m., and one hour be-
fore performances.
All seating is reserved. Ad-
vanced purchase for seating is
recommended.
The Sound of Music will be
the final production in Cottage
Theatre’s current auditorium.
The theatre will be closing tem-
porarily in May for a major re-
modeling project that will add
50 seats. A variety of technical
and safety features will also
be upgraded. Cottage Theatre
will resume its 2019 season in
October with The Complete
Works of William Shakespeare
(abridged).
