WMU performs new spring play

WINFIELD — Elementary students, high school students, teachers, staff and the community came together last week as the Winfield-Mt. Union School put together a whole musical production complete with two performances in less than a week.

Previously, WMU has worked with a theater group out of Minnesota to put together a play in a week’s time, but this year music teacher Lindsey Pogmore took on the challenge of not only directing students for the spring play alongside Jill Townsley and Mollie Hinkle, but also writing the script and music.

Those attending the WMU spring play enjoyed an entertaining performance from 30-plus actors ranging from first grade through high school, and the students appreciated an opportunity to take to the stage and explore a new experience.

“We wanted to have something that everyone could do,” Pogmore said of the play. “So, they auditioned Monday and they practiced all week.”

WMU Junior Pacey Schlee, who played Snow White, says she previously did the play with the company from Minnesota when she was younger, but this was her first time participating as a high school student.

According to Schlee, the experience was different and gave her the opportunity to work with the younger students in a mentor-type role.

“We definitely taught the younger kids how to keep themselves under control,” Schlee said. “I actually did some of their hair before the play, too. So, that was kind of a fun little bonding experience with them.”

For seventh-grader Shaye Nelson, who played Curly Mouse, acting in the spring play meant she got to hang out with her friends and make new ones, much like the story of the play itself.

WMU’s spring play, Mother Goose’s Storytelling Festival wove an entertaining tale of a lonesome wicked witch, played by Brynn Pogmore, with hurt feelings mixing up well-known fairy tales throughout the land of Featherbrooke all due to a delayed invitation to Mother Goose’s Storytelling Festival.

“What do you do with a mixed-up story?” the cast of Mother Goose’s Storytelling Festival sang. “Hey-ho, you make it better.”

Throughout the story narrated by Tweedle Dee (played by Monte Izatt) and Tweedle Dum (played by Howard Meeker), familiar characters such as the Big Bad Wolf (played by Mollie Hinkle), the Mad Hatter (played by Elaina Allen), Miss Muffet (played by Laurelai Fowler), and Bo Peep (played by Hanna Zambrano), ran into unexpected characters as they learned lessons about making friends.

The lighthearted fun included the Mad Hatter trying to put Humpty Dumpty, played by Evelyn Arnold, back together again with duct tape because “duct tape fixes everything.”

Additionally, Jack and the Beanstalk readily invited new friends to “a world beyond adventure,” as he showed off his own fairy tale to the three blind mice and Little Miss Muffet learned that spiders aren’t all that bad as the characters sorted their way through the confusing world created by the disappointed Wicked Witch.

All is well that ends well, though, as the Wicked Witch eventually receives her invitation and the whole crew came together for one last song, “Make New Friends,” to end the production.

Comments: AnnaMarie.Ward@southeastiowaunion.com