Jason Gingold (Harold Hill) is overjoyed to be performing in his 4^th production at KFT. The last two seasons he has played Shrek in Shrek, the Cat in Honk! and Rooster Hannigan in Annie. Here is what he had to say about his experience in The Music Man:

"Like many people, I was a kid when I fell in love with the classic movie version of The Music Man with Robert Preston. The music is infectious and fun. The characters are endearing and unforgettable: the Mayor and his boisterous wife; Shirley Jones’s lovely, lost, and ultimately transformed Marian the librarian; darling Winthrop Paroo and his sweet lisp; the rebellious Tommy Djilas and the feisty Zaneeta Shinn. There’s even a barbershop quartet!" 

"But at the center of the movie, the thing that always stayed with me, was (is) Robert Preston’s performance as Harold Hill. Even watching it today, he absolutely jumps off the screen – he can’t be contained: the glint in his eye, the boundless energy, the underlying mischief at every moment. I loved it. It’s indelible. It’s the performance all Harold Hills will forever be compared to." 

"So it is really a dream come true to jump into those shoes and see what I can make of Harold Hill. As an actor, I’ve enjoyed the chance to make Professor Hill my own. We have been looking to explore some of the nuanced complexities of this character, trying to find the distinctions between when Harold is “on the con” and when he’s being real; when he’s a swindler and when he’s a man in love. The challenge is to make him authentic and human, but also as magnetic and otherworldly as the Harold Hill I fell in love with as a kid." 

"I am also very fond of the story of The Music Man. Oddly, it sits somewhere between realistic and preposterous – a con man pretending to sell boys’ bands across the country brings music, color, life, and passion to a quiet, stubborn Iowa town. How wonderful is that? I’m deeply drawn to the idea of finding life’s joy, its color, of living with vibrancy. His scam and deceits aside, Harold Hill is essentially about that too. I try to think of him less of a spellbinder and thief, and more of a bringer of wonder and music. As he tells Winthrop, “I always think there’s a band, kid.” It’s my favorite line. Within the play, I think it says so much about his character. Outside of the context of the play, I think it speaks volumes about the need to see goodness, to see art, to feel things, to find positivity, to be predisposed to appreciate the world around you. I think the people of River City need that in this show, and I think the world could use a dose of that too."

"The last thing I’ll mention is that the whole experience of The Music Man at Kitsap Forest Theater, is immeasurably enhanced by the fact that I get to do it with my family. In this production, my wife, Molly, is Eulalie Mackecknie Shinn. My daughter, Sadie, is Gracie Shinn. And my son, Charlie, is Winthrop Paroo. To take the stage as a family, to work together, to play together in this way, I think is unique to Kitsap and the theater community it fosters. I’m not the only cast member with a family in the show. And it makes for a pretty special ensemble feeling and a pretty remarkable show." 

There are two more weekends to see this wonderful show - get your tickets now and plan a day away in the forest to have Harold Hill take you back to another time and place. 

By Michael C. Moore, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Kitsap Sun Review, May 30, 2016: There are many pleasures to be derived from the Mountaineers Players' production of "The Music Man," which warmed up an opening-day crowd on a chilly, unpromising May 28 at Kitsap Forest Theater with a fast-moving, funny run-through that featured outstanding lead performances, generally tremendous singing and impressive, inventive visuals.

Heat the joint up a few degrees and I'd gladly go back and see it again.

The thing about the Forest Theater is that it can be as much about the tradition as it is about the particular show on offer. Folks have been hiking down the trail to the rustic amphitheater since 1923 — to see a show, but also to picnic, to have an afternoon out with the family, and because that's what you do on the Memorial Day weekend. Sometimes the show is just all right; sometimes it's better.

The Mountaineers' "Music Man" — director Craig Schieber's take on Meredith Willson's ingeniously evergreen tale of the redemptive power of love — is the latter. It not only does one of the musical-theater canon's sturdiest entries no harm (despite the venue's obvious drawbacks), but enhances it with a brisk pace and imaginative visuals, and pays respect to its parade of wonderful songs with mostly outstanding singing, both solo and ensemble.

Of course, the "experience" of a show at KFT is never going to be a strictly theatrical one. It's the place's blessing and its curse that eating, moving freely about and being too young to care much about what's going on down on the floor are all in a day's play there. If you're one of those set-jawed, tunnel-focused mavens who go to the play strictly to see the play, this probably ain't the spot for you.

To his credit, though, Schieber makes no concession to the young, the bored or the distracted among the theater's patrons. His pieces — "Music Man" being only the current example — ally with, but don't depend on, the novelty of their forest setting, and would stand up well on any stage in the county.

In "The Music Man," the Mountaineers have selected one of the most can't-miss musicals ever written: It's a great story, laced with comedy and conflict, romance and resolution and a little bit of an edge, and loaded with memorable songs (I'm not the only one who thinks "76 Trombones" ranks with any march Sousa ever wrote, am I?).

And in Jason Gingold and Beaven Walters, they've got lead actor-singers who are more than worthy of their iconic characters. Both — Gingold as the "spellbinder" Professor Harold Hill, who finds himself spellbound by the prissy librarian (Walters as Marian Paroo) of the town he's pulled into for his latest swindle — do top-drawer acting and singing jobs, with Walters supplying particularly glorious vocals for "Goodnight My Someone" and Gingold ably tongue-twisting his way through the 1962-vintage rap of "Trouble."

There's some classy supporting work going on, too. Jenny Dreessen brings her lovely voice and adds a credible Irish accent as Marian's long-suffering mother; Tod Harrick overplays — but to good comic effect — the uptight Mayor Shinn; Molly Hall is a delightfully pliable Eulalie; and 9-year-old Charlie Gingold (Jason and Molly's son; daughter Sadie is also in the cast) is a charmer as the introverted Winthrop. Two Kitsap locals also get to make their marks — Eric Emans plays Hill's partner in crime Marcellus Washburn; Gary Spees is the baritone in the iconic barbershop quartet, and is half (along with Dee Smolar) of the show's best sight gag, a now-you-see-it-now-you-don't parody of the"American Gothic" painting.

Like the frame for that quick, effective laugh, almost all of Schieber's set pieces (designed by Chris Stanley) are portable; furniture and flats transform the performance space simply, efficiently and effectively. Aside from a few talky bits, things never drag. Costumes (by Brenna Stratton) are colorful and eye-catching, and the choreography (by Guy Caridi) supplies not only the expected dance sequences, but keeps the cast of 50-plus, including a number of small-fry, moving and contributing to the storytelling.

Accompanist Benjamin Bentler, on piano and synths, plays immaculately. But the keyboards just can't evoke the big-brass-band oomph of much of Willson's music, and sometimes are buried under the bigger ensemble vocals (not to mention the usual clatter from the gallery). They're much more effective behind the ballads. And it might've just been an opening-day foible, but the show's brilliant opening — the a cappella "Rock Island" — didn't work very well. It's all about rhythm, but for that particular performance, there just wasn't much.

My best experiences at the Forest Theater have always been when the show is the big feature, and the "experience" is a bonus. "Music Man" is one such occasion — the ambiance is rendered secondary because the show is good enough to carry the day on its own.

Kitsap Sun Preview, May 24, 2016; By Michael C. Moore, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Craig Schieber's last experience with "The Music Man" at the Kitsap Forest Theater was 15 years ago. He said the version he's directing there now won't bear much of a resemblance.

"Sixteen years ago, I don't think I had an appreciation for this show," said Schieber, who's directed at least one of the Mountaineers Players' two annual productions at the Forest Theatre since 2000. "When we did it then, we had most of the stage covered in boardwalk, big buildings, and the big house up on the mound."

But Schieber has learned a lot in his years putting on shows in the idyllic amphitheater, carved out of old-growth forest in the early 1920s and active as a performance venue ever since. For this year's "Music Man," he's gone two-dimensional.

"We really had fun with this one," he said. "We've got some furniture, some chairs, and we've got a piano. Pretty much everything else is two-dimensional flats.

"This is a real change" from the 2001 production, he said.

"The Music Man," Meredith Willson's classic tale (and his only significant hit) about a flimflam man who transforms and is transformed by a backwater Iowa town and its naive inhabitants, actually lends itself pretty well to the Forest Theater's al fresco aesthetic. Most of the production numbers already take place in the out-of-doors, and those that don't are easily representable with Schieber's portable-set strategy.

"We're using some two-sided flats that'll take you right inside a building," Schieber said. "For the library, we have one side that's the outside, and then we just flip them around and it's the inside."

The library, for those not already in the know about what transpires in "The Music Man," is ground zero, where the mysterious Harold Hill, in town to sell the idea of a boys' band, and the staid librarian Marian Paroo each meet their match.