Local children star in adaptation of well-known play

“Sleeping Beauty” is one of the most famous and well-known fairy tales. At 7:30 p.m. Saturday, the Missoula Children’s Theatre will present its adaption of the classic in the Young Auditorium.

The Missoula Children’s Theatre, a company from Montana, casts children in their productions, which are featured at the Young Auditorium annually.

“We wanted to not only have our venue to be a place for kids to come see, but to get kids involved in performances by being actively involved,” Young Auditorium Education and Outreach Coordinator Shannon Dozoryst said.

Dozoryst’s main responsibility is to overlook the university’s program to allow children K-12 to see the performing arts performances.  She also organizes events for artists to perform for children at schools.

“This adaption of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ has similar ties to the original, but it’s not like the Disney version,” Dozoryst said.

The playwrights at Missoula write and direct their own versions of the plays, so the fairytales differ from what is usually expect.
The play is cast, practiced and performed in a one-week time frame, so casting for the play is done differently than normal.

A pair of two actor/director combinations, Hannah Strickland and Carolyn Garrison, arrived at Whitewater on Monday.  From 4-6 p.m. the same day, they held a large-group audition in which they played theater games with the children.

After, Strickland and Garrison chose their cast of around 50 children.  The children will rehearse all week until they perform on Saturday.      During the performance, one of the two actor/directors will actually sub in and be part of “Sleeping Beauty,” but this will be the only adult in the play.

Dozoryst said she is hoping for word to get out about the casting for the play because she would like to see more children showing up for the casting process.

“I’d really like to get the word out to not only faculty, but also students with children,”  Dozoryst said. “Usually we see just about 100 kids audition, and it would be great to see our campus community participate as well.”