Editor's Note: Saturday's performance is a matinee at 2 pm.
Drama students from Brooks Secondary School will be bringing a bit of Narnia to the stage at Max Cameron Theatre this week.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe opens Wednesday night with repeat performances on Friday and Saturday nights.
The play, based on CS Lewis’s classic children’s novel, is being performed by Brooks Acting 11/12 class with help from other students from the school.
“It’s a strong team,” said drama teacher and director Brenda Laycock, adding that the cast includes a wide range of actors, some as young as nine years old. “It took every one of them to make this work.”
Actors are strategically placed for the best effect. “Some of my strongest actors are playing the bad guys,” she said. “If you don’t have evil, you’ve no need to do anything about it.”
The story, the first in a series of seven novels that make up The Chronicles of Narnia, was first published in 1950 by the English novelist and lay Christian theologist.
The story takes place mostly in Narnia, a land of talking animals and mythical creatures, which has been ruled by the White Witch who has kept the land frozen for the past century.
Four English children, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy, who have been evacuated from London during World War II to escape the Blitz, are living in a country house when they find a gateway to the mythical land of Narnia through a wardrobe in a spare room of the home. They soon find themselves on an adventure to save Narnia and their lives.
“It’s not really just a children’s story,” said Laycock, describing one of the most resonant messages being that poor leadership should not be accepted and people are obligated to fight for what is right.
This version of the script has been around for a number of years and Laycock presented the play while she was teaching drama in Surrey almost 20 years ago.
The sets are simpler than in previous productions and were designed and built by Vancouver Island University carpentry instructor Garry Huculak.
“It’s mostly about the characters, the costumes and the makeup,” she said, “but a lot of people have chipped in and we have got a lot of talent in this town. We’re spending a small fortune on costumes and they are really amazing.”
Laycock has been teaching drama for 34 years and she has never received the level of dedication from the community that she has in Powell River.
Tickets for the shows can be bought at the Brooks box office for $10 each and go on sale at 6 pm on the nights of the show. Three performances are planned for 7 pm on Wednesday, May 7 and Friday, May 9, and a matinee at 2 pm Saturday, May 10. For more information, readers can contact the school at 604.483.3171.
