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It’s definitely not a Disney flick, but the director, cast and crew of this year’s Chisago Lakes High School musical know they are putting together something just as memorable.

Director Dave Seaburg and members of this year’s musical, Cinderella, have already been working weeks to put together a show that could rival last year’s Bye Bye Birdie in popularity with audience members.

The Rogers and Hammerstein version of Cinderella being put together at CLHS will resemble the Disney version only slightly.

That’s not to say it’s not a family show, sophomore Kurt Hattenberger said.

Hattenberger is part of the cast in the musical, playing a steward and townsperson.

“It has more songs and a more medeival-feel,” he said. “It’s still good for kids – it’s funny too.”

He and fellow townspeople castmembers Johanna Hawkinson and Ross Wolf, both sophomores, tried to sum up the genre of the musical as a romantic comedy, but even that doesn’t fully describe it.

Hattenberger and Wolf were part of the cast of Bye Bye Birdie last year, so they knew how much fun it was to be part of a musical and wanted to do it again. They joined other students at auditions the first day of school in September. “That was early – last year we didn’t start until mid-September,” Wolf said.

All three said they are having a lot of fun rehearsing, sometimes more than two hours in the early evenings.

“It’s great, it’s hectic, but fun,” Hattenberger said. “There is so much energy all over, it’s all awesome.”

Hawkinson said they don’t mind that the principal characters in the play have most of the dialogue. “It’s fun, the dancing is fun – we get to waltz,” she said.

Senior Sonja Tosteson plays the Fairy Godmother in the musical. She is no stranger to the stage, after being part of Bye Bye Birdie last year and numerous performances through the Masquers theater company in Forest Lake.

She said it has been very fun to be a part of Cinderella and hopes to move on to possibly major in theater at college next year.

Sophomore Dan Hazel plays the Prince. Cinderella will be the 17th play of his career; he performs regularly with Masquers and the Youth Performing Artists.

Right now, he is trying to keep his lines straight while working on two plays at once – Cinderella and A Christmas Carol at YPA.

“It’s a lot of work to keep the two straight,” he said.

It’s also hard to find time for homework as he rehearses six days a week. Usually Sundays are reserved for schoolwork, he said.

With all his experience, Hazel said he has seen things go wrong on stage.

“There is always something, some interesting development,” he said. “But a lot of it is in the moment, you have to go with the flow.”

He is enjoying working on Cinderella, and hopes people coming to see the play will be pleasantly surprised.

“It’s a lot of fun. There’s a lot more to this than the Disney version. It portrays the characters well,” he said. “But it will still be a lot of fun to bring the kids, too.”

The set has been designed and constructed by the shop classes at CLHS. One set will be used throughout the musical, with different pieces being slid on and off to accent various scenes. The foam castle is pale blue now, but will look like a realistic brick castle fit for a prince when completed.

As the cast rehearses its scenes, a different cast from the sound and lighting booth is making sure they are not kept in the dark.

Head Performing Arts Center Coordinator Matt Mitchell ensures that the technical crew of nine members is learning their jobs along the way.

During rehearsals, the tech crew is positioned at various locations around the auditorium, including balconies and the main booth. Right now, their job is to simply learn some of the complicated controls in the booth and how the sound system operates. Once the set is completed, they will have a better idea of what type of lighting to use for each scene.

Mitchell, who graduated last year, has helped run the PAC tech center since his freshman year at CLHS. He has been involved with the production of seven plays there and hopes to continue while attending classes at Century College.

He doesn’t foresee a lot of unique challenges when it comes to sound and lighting for Cinderella.

“It will probably be like last year with Bye Bye Birdie,” he said. “But this is definitely not a like the cartoon.”

In addition to training tech crew members, it is Mitchell’s job to handle scheduling, billing and maintenance in the PAC.

The challenge is to keep enlisting the help of younger students in the sound and light booth. The order of training basically starts with upperclassmen taking the underclassmen under their wing and teaching them how to run the equipment. This year’s crew is lacking underclassmen to take over that leadership role next year.

One upperclassman is senior Kelly Wolf, who has learned how to run the systems. She’s waiting to help figure out lighting for the play while watching rehearsals. Wolf said hopefully that part will start next week, after the MEA break.

Sophomore Nicole Rodriguez was selling tickets for last year’s musical and knew she wanted to be more involved this year, so she joined the tech crew.

While she is just learning, she said there will be two or three people in the booth during the play, overseeing the action. The others will be out in the theater, manning spotlights on the main floor and up above and watching for any problems. She is excited to be a part of Cinderella.

Other major characters in the play are Cinderella, played by Kristina Weise, the King, played by Jonathan Lundberg, the Queen, played by Ashley Anne Anderson, the Stepmother, played by Alexandra Ward and the Stepsisters, played by Katie Langenfeld and Alyssa Ward. Riley Cavanaugh plays the Herald and Aaron Holt plays the Chef.

Jason Bryant is co-directing the play with Seaburg. He is in his first year teaching English at CLHS. Natalie Peterson is directing the music for the play.

The musical will run Nov. 17-19 at 7 p.m., with a 2 p.m. matinee performance added Nov. 19.

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