SAXTONS RIVER — Main Street Arts opens its production of Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore on Saturday, July 6, at Vermont Academy's Horowitz Performing Arts Center.
The lively operetta runs Saturdays, July 6 and 13, Thursday, July 11, and Friday, July 12, with curtain at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, July 7, with a matinee at 2 p.m.
The cast includes veteran actors Falko Schilling as Sir Joseph Porter, Michael Duffin as Ralph Rackstraw, and Constance Bryan as Josephine.
Schilling is well known in the area for his roles at the Weston Playhouse and the Saxtons River Playhouse.
Duffin has appeared in local theater and in many MSA productions, including Equus, Les Mis, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
A veteran of community theater and previous Gilbert & Sullivan roles, Bryan has appeared at MSA in Jesus Christ Superstar, Chicago, and as Florence (“I married the piano man”) in Charles Henry's Final Curtain.
Other cast members include Kathleen Bryar (Buttercup), Victor Brandt (Capt. Corcoran), Jack Bryar (Dick Deadeye), Frank Sibley (Bill Bobstay), and Gail Hass (Cousin Hebe).
Rounding out the cast are various sailors, cousins, sisters, and aunts played by Teya Bryan, Rick Cowan, Greg Sweeney, Ira Wilner, Marit Bjerkadal, Miranda Fuller, Sadie MacDougal, and Elizabeth Nieuwsma-Dell.
Annesa Hartman is the director and choreographer, and Ken Olsson is music director.
The production is part of the Great River Theater Festival that runs two weekends beginning Friday, July 5, opening at MSA at 7:30 p.m. with the landmark punk-rock musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch and continuing over that weekend and the next with performances and events, including The Great Tent Event and the Bake Your Art Out dessert contest.
The full schedule can be found at www.greatrivertheaterfestival.org.