The cast for the musical Mary Poppins has been selected. The musical will take place in the auditorium between March 10-12 at 7:15 pm. The musical is a nice way to entertain the students of Smoky.

“ To decide the cast we have a panel of people, usually seven. For Mary Poppins we had the dance instructor, the choir instructor, and stage manager, and other things,”says Tim Brown, the drama club teacher.

“They have to do a vocal, acting and a dance audition and then we grade all of those and put our scores together and look at the ones who scored the highest and see who fits which role based on what the playwright would have intended.” says Brown.

The crew takes a big part in the making of the play too, “without the crew we wouldn’t have the lights or the sound or the set. Especially with a show like Mary Poppins, that’s so dependent on the technical aspects, without them it wouldn’t be the same show.” says Brown

Rehearsals start everyday after school when auditions are over. They last usually around 8 or 9 weeks until the show starts. “Before vocal rehearsals we do some singing exercises but other than that we don’t really warm up, you just go on stage and do your thing,” says freshman Katie Hall. She plays a doll and a dancer in Mary Poppins.

In a musical, every character usually has a singing role, “sometimes you may not see me on stage but I’ll be backstage backing up someone as a chorus member who is performing,” says Hall.

“I always try to make the students recognize how important what they do is for the community. People come and choose to spend a couple of hours with them and hopefully that helps them forget their lives outside the auditorium and make there lives a little bit better,” says Brown.