Unto MDI, A Great Community Production is Born!
ACT handles massive cast and massive fun in upcoming Best Christmas Pageant Ever production
The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Side Street Cafe.
BAR HARBOR—When the actors head into rehearsal at the Mount Desert Island High School Saturday afternoon, they seem like more than friends; they seem like family members that love each other, that get along well, that are excited to see each other.
The truth is, though, that some of them have only just met as these rehearsals for The Best Christmas Pageant Ever began with the first read-through of the play, September 16.
The production is really about remembering what matters on Christmas but also on every day—each other, community, and empathy.
“How was your Halloween?” one girl asks before the rehearsal starts.
Another girl bounces on her toes and calls across the room. “Liberty! Where are you sitting?”
“I didn’t pick a spot. Where do you want me to sit?” Liberty asks.
Hands fly up in the air. There is much looking around. Close by, holding hands, facing each other, two girls—one older and one younger—swing their arms in time with each other, enthusiastic to be together again. It has been six days—since Monday.
“Charlie’s back! Charlie lives!” a chorus of voices announce.
However, it’s not clear who exactly Charlie is.
Charlie could be anyone here or no one at all.
Behind a large double desk set up, director and off-duty guidance counselor, Mark Carignan sits. Jack-o-lanterns with marked-on faces perch on papers and folders. Guitars hang off walls. Music stands dominate the spaces of the room.
Carignan calls out in a booming voice, “Grab scripts, grab pencils. Let’s start with notes.”
Leaning forward on the desk. “Everybody got pencils poised? Excellent.”
Tiers of the music room that are shrouded in semi darkness and a plethora of currently silent cellos stand witness to the rehearsal—sentinels of the music about to be created. But before that, a little sharing has to occur.
“Do you want your beef stick?” a teen asks a young man. He nods. There’s a beef stick hand off as she explains. “I got tipped in meat.”
There are giggles. She repeats the statement.
After notes, there are a cappella Christmas songs.
“This has to be the most exuberant sound explosion that’s ever come out of your lungs,” Carignan says. He expounds on this for a full thirty seconds without taking a breath, sending the room of about twenty actors and crew into peals of laughter. One girl bends over at the waist, barely staying on her chair. The overhead lights switch off. The overhead lights switch on.
And so “Joy to the World” begins.
The rehearsals and the community that begins during the months-long process are about joy and creating family from friends and joint experience as they all create a musical together, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.
That’s part of Carignan’s goals for Acadia Community Theater, which is a nonprofit that, according to its website “seeks to enrich the lives of individuals, families and the community by encouraging growth and expression in theater arts and by providing live performances on and around Mount Desert Island.” He wants to lure in new actors and lure back some who have wandered off on other life adventures.
His plan? It’s working.
“There’s a community that has formed,” he said. “This group of strangers has really gelled very nicely together.”
The musical and the community is about humor and finesse and being there for each other no matter what even when you’re brand-new to the theater world.
One first time actor, David Gartner of Lamoine, was cajoled into trying out.
“You’re wife and son are trying out, so why not make it a trifecta?” Carignan had asked.
Gartner tried out. He got a role, but he also fell off scaffolding at work.
“It really screwed up his knee,” Carignan explaind.
Gartner was in a full-on leg brace for two weeks, off feet for six weeks.
“He said to the surgeon, ‘Can I put this off until after the play?’” Carignan said. “He’s going to be living in discomfort and pain for two months extra just so he can be in the play.”
And that? That’s not just about the show that must go on. It’s about the kindness and the responsibility that happens when good people make a commitment to a community.
“That is very impressive to me. It makes me very happy. I would never ask someone to do that for me,” Carignan says. “He’s just exceptional.”
The play and the rehearsals might be addictive and exceptional themselves. The lines are silly. The performers are enthusiastic and lean into the chaos, joy, and goofiness of their lines. Those off stage are often cracking up even though they’ve heard the same lines and bits over and over again.
The play focuses on a couple trying to get a Christmas pageant together despite a family of kids that have been terrorizing the community for years. These kids—the Herdmans—are somehow in the Christmas pageant. Everyone knows this is madness. They’ll make it the worst Christmas pageant ever.
But they don’t. Do they? Instead, they provide a backdrop for Hancock County actors to shine.
According to the Lion Heart Theater, “Community theatre provides locals with a platform in which they can express themselves without judgment — something we need more of in today’s world. Like self-knowledge, these performances can remind us how we can work together to better our society.”
Theater, and being involved in it, promotes creativity, can bring about change, can make us look inward, can even help a community, according to Lion Heart. It adds, “With these new insights, we can create innovative solutions to societal issues and try to make the world a better place, one community at a time.”
A community like Mount Desert Island has traditionally had multiple feeder programs for A.C.T. and A.C.T. feeds other programs right back. SFOA, the schools, and even the Grand Theater in Ellsworth all fold in to create a reciprocity and build the stable of actors and musicians and crew. But COVID-19 dampened the numbers a bit. Now, hopefully, those numbers will keep building back, so more and more actors and crew and musicians can help make Mount Desert Island an even better place, one performance, one commercial, at a time.
To watch the fun and support A.C.T., head to a show.
Performances are Friday, December 6 and Saturday, December 7 at 7 p.m., and then matinees are on Saturday, December 7 and Sunday, December 8 at 2 p.m. All performances will be at Acadia Repertory Theatre on Main Street in Somesville.
ABOUT A.C.T.
According to its website, “In 1994 a group of teachers formed the “‘After School Players’ to stage shows for and including children in the Mount Desert Island, Maine area. This group was subsequently renamed the Union 98 Teachers’ Theater. According to an e-mail from Debbie Mountford, that first group included Mark Puglisi, Maryann Van Dorn, Debbie Mountford (nee Hacket), Paul Winkler, Paula Richardson-Gannon ‘and whoever else we could nab!’”
“In 2000, the group formed the non-profit corporation Acadia Community Theater and shortly thereafter was recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)3 charitable organization. The activities of Acadia Community Theater are overseen by a volunteer board of directors.”
ABOUT THE MUSICAL
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever is billed as a hilarious Christmas classic where wildness ensues as a couple try to put on a church Christmas pageant. The problem is the Herdman kids. These children are awful, “probably the most inventively awful kids in history. You won't believe the mayhem – and the fun – when the Herdmans collide head-on with the story of Christmas!”
It’s based on the 1972 novel of the same name by Barbara Robinson as is an upcoming movie that’s set to be released this year.
The production team includes:
Director: Mark Carrignan
Producer: Patti Savoie
Asst Director: Jacob Sanner
Stage Manager: Kate Young
Technical Director: Matthew Hochman
The cast includes:
Julia Axtell, Violet Axtel, Lina Bodge, Zieva Brown, Liberty Carter, Anne Dalton, Greg Dalton, Josh Dalton, Tanya Dalton, Will Dalton, Abby Damon, Bailey DeGeorge, Filippa Dilena, Anna Ellis, Emily Ellis, David Gartner, Eli Gartner, Ezra Gartner, Melanie Gartner, Vivi Gaudrault, Hallie Hamblen, James Hopkins, Kennedy Hopkins, Will Krason, Violet Maldonado, Jonah McLean, Syd Schneider, Mike Watkins, Amity Watkins, Mallory Watkins, Petya Watkins, Maeve Westphal, and Ayla Wren.
All photos: Carrie Jones/Bar Harbor Story
MDI HIGH SCHOOL PRESENTS CHICAGO
In just two weekends, MDI High School Drama (which is not ACT) presents CHICAGO at the Higgins-Demas Theater at the high school. If you’re looking for some live performance fix and great talent, head on over and then check out A.C.T. next month.
LINKS TO LEARN MORE
TO BUY TICKETS FOR THE BEST CHRISTMAS PAGENT EVER
CHICAGO TICKETS AND MDI DRAMA INFO
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