'Seven Brides for Seven Brothers' Post Falls High to present musical this weekend
<p>Post Falls High students, front row from left, Caroline Rowland and Amy Anderson and, back row, Karen Hunt, Rebecca Alexander, Hailey Smith and Sidney Helberg, prepare for the upcoming musical fundraiser "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" that opens on Thursday. Other showings are Friday and Saturday.</p>
POST FALLS - The Post Falls High theater and music departments will present the 1954 musical "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the school.
The Thursday showing is a dinner fundraiser for the Post Falls Food Bank and the departments sponsored by Hot Rod Cafe. Dinner will be from 5 to 6:30 and the curtain opens at 7 sharp.
Cost is $15. Advance tickets are available at the food bank, Super 1 Foods in Post Falls and at the high school.
Other showings are Friday and Saturday nights at 7 and Saturday at 2 p.m. The doors open 45 minutes before the show. Tickets for Friday and Saturday are available at the school and Super 1 and cost $5.
Proceeds from Friday and Saturday benefit the drama and music departments only. Advance tickets are encouraged. Shows have sold out in recent years.
"We have a wonderfully talented cast of 26 students led by Alex Carey and Rebecca Alexander as Adam Pontipee and Milly, in addition to all the students behind the scenes," said parent Julie Hunt.
Adam is a backwoodsman and his new bride, Milly, agrees to marry him after knowing him only a few hours.
While returning with him to his cabin, Milly is surprised to learn that Adam is one of seven brothers living there. The brothers are named alphabetically from the Old Testament - Adam, Benjamin, Caleb, Daniel, Ephraim, Frank (short for Frankincense) and Gideon.
Milly teaches Adam's rowdy younger brothers manners and how to dance. They test those manners at a barn raising, where they meet six girls they like. However, the girls already have suitors from town, who taunt the brothers into fighting. Although the brothers do not start the fight, they are turned back by the townspeople after the barn was destroyed.
The musical, directed by Stanley Donen, is known for unusual choreography, which makes dance numbers out of such mundane frontier pursuits as chopping wood and raising a barn. The film was a 1954 Oscar nominee for Best Picture.
In 1981, a stage version was created using material from the classic movie with additional material created by Academy Award-winning writers Al Kasha and Joel Hirschhorn.