Page 41 - San Angelo

Get Your Gun! …Now sit back, relax, and enjoy the show.” The actors sing, dance, whirl and glide across the stage. Petticoats, high heels, knife-throwing and a real-live dog make the scene lively and loud. ACT’s youth production commenced with auditions and a workshop six months earlier. Children took their turns on-stage to audition in front of the director and music director. Almost all who showed up wore boots. Some girls wore braids. Boys had on jeans. “It helps you to get in the right mood for the audition if you wear something western,” one teen explained. Some of the potential cast members had never auditioned before, while others have tried out for ACT’s production multiple times.

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It is 7:00 on a Friday night in late February, and spirits are high backstage at Angelo Civic Theatre. Thirty four young cast members buzz around, popping in and out of closets and dressing rooms into narrow hallways calling out to each other. Child actors apply smudgy paint to their faces while others draw graffti on the long strips of butcher paper that adorn the walls for just this purpose. Wigs are adjusted, props are double-checked, and a voice calls, “5 minutes to places – Act One.” Doors open and shut. Little bodies elbow larger ones out of the way to share a look in the hall mirror. An announcement from the overhead speakers, “Welcome to Angelo Civic Theatre’s production of Irving Berlin’s Annie

Hometown Living At Its Best 39