Books Come Alive! Catalina Magdalena Cast (Stage Right Greensburg)

The cast for “Catalina Magdalena Hoopensteiner Wallendeiner Hogan Bogan Logan Was Her Name” poses with Mr. McFeely (David Newell) at the Fayette County Fair, Jun 16.

My daughter plays the young Catalina, who also narrates. In the photo, she’s the one holding the book (with some her lines taped inside. Shh, don’t tell!)

Working on this show was kind of a baptism by fire — she got the script Wednesday afternoon, had a single rehearsal Friday afternoon, then performed the show twice Saturday. For part of the show, Carolyn gets to interact with the audience, offering a gold star to anyone who can say her ridiculously long name. The show also includes some song-and-dance routines that the rest of the cast already learned as part of a show choir (The Sensations), so for now Carolyn was told just to go into the audience and get people on their feet. Plus, in this outdoor informal venue, you have to capture the attention of people walking by from one event to the other.

I’ve never seen her do that kind of audience interaction before, but Tony (the director) tells me she did fine — though during the rest of the show, she could slow down a little.

All the cast members I spoke to, who have done these shows before, said yesterday’s shows went great.

I’m proud of Carolyn, not only because she went from getting a new script to performing before a live audience in just a few days, but because when the group went out to lunch, she went to the play area in McDonalds because she wanted to (even though the other kids were too cool to go), that she ordered something that comes fairly close to being real food  (at least a chicken snack wrap has, you know, chicken in it), and that she wore her seatbelt in the van (most of the time… we had a little talk bout that).

This talented young cast will perform this show about 20 more times at libraries, schools, and other public events this summer. Other books being promoted via the Stage Right Greensburg Books Come Alive series include Olivia, McKenna — Ready to Fly, Captain Awesome, and Jake Starts School.