Harvey TTA 1997

Well, I have already fallen behind in highlighting one past production per week. I'm sure you'll forgive me since my days are filled with teacher meetings and my nights have been filled with class (Monday), orientation (Tuesday) and church (Wednesday). Thankfully tonight I do not have a scheduled event. I do need to work on my wonderful lessons for next week!

Last week I highlighted my first production at MBA in 1993. Today I am going to jump to my second production of Harvey at Tennessee Temple Academy in 1997.

This is a picture of the cast:

Even if you do not know the students, it is fun to see similarities between like characters. One of my favorite memories of this play was opening night when I was running around trying to make sure everything was ready. I walked out into the auditorium and was greeted by two familiar faces, Oz Price and Mrs. Price (from Maranatha).

Oz had played the lead role in the MBA play four years before. I was so elated to see them. For some reason they were passing through town and the Temple campus and happened to see the posters for the play. Since the artwork was the same, they knew I had to be the director. What a wonderful joy to have a former Harvey cast member in the audience that night.

Great memories!

Aaron Leatherman played a hilarious Mr. Wilson and Rachel Harrison Ragan a perfect Mrs. Chauvenet. They are both married now (not to each other of course)! My how quickly time flies. I saw Rachel at Remembrandts a few weeks ago. Her little boy is named Harrison (I wonder where they got that name??) and she has another baby due in February.

Jessica Hutchison and Anna Vaupel were some of the first high school students I met at Temple. In addition to both girls being talented actresses , they went on to Temple University and were on the Columbine drama team about 3 years later. Anna graduated from Temple University with a Bachelor's in Speech Education a few years ago. She and I have a rich history together. I am so proud of her. Having just arrived in China, she will be teaching English there for the next 2 years. You will hear more about her as she has been in many of my plays and drama teams.

The last thing I remember about this production was that it was a week or two before we got married in 1997. I got sick at the beginning of the week of production and went to the doctor. I guess I thought I was superwoman and thought I could teach school, direct a play and get married all in the same month. The doctor wasn't sure what my "disease" was and so he quarantined me to my apartment. I said, "No, I'm sorry, sir, I can't stay in, you don't understand." His professional reply was, "No, I'm sorry but you don't understand." I had to stay home for 2 days. Dr. Hunt, my principal, was wonderful and had all of the cast members and seniors run errands for me. My good friend David Sneed stepped in and directed the dress rehearsal and I showed up for the performances that weekend. All went well and the rest is history!