Lincoln County Will Climb Every Mountain For A Musical Rural Towns Field 61-Member Cast For ‘Sound Of Music’

The Sprague-Harrington High School weight room on Saturday is alive with the sound of music.

Thirty minutes before curtain time, cast members dodge dumbbells to dab themselves with pancake makeup and warm up their voices in what passes for the Green Room.

Like most actors about to take the stage, members of Harrington’s civic theatre troupe are edgy. The 200-person crowd outside has high expectations from the troupe’s 8th annual offering - this year, “The Sound of Music.”

In this tiny farming community, preparations for the show have been in the works since the fall harvest. It’s the biggest event in town, except, perhaps, for varsity boys’ basketball.

“Every year, it just builds and builds and builds,” says director Linda Knapp. “People say they plan vacations around the musicals. They just know to be home in early December.”

The cast of 61 is drawn from the little towns that dot the region’s wheat fields. It’s a huge troupe, considering the population of Harrington is about 500.

So many kids tried out this year that Knapp formed two sets of von Trapp children. But the only member with any professional experience is Eileen Paulson, who founded the troupe, K/P Productions, with Knapp eight years ago.

Paulson sang in the Seattle Symphony chorus. She’s now warming her voice to belt it out as Maria.

But don’t mistake a lack of experience for lack of talent, cast members say, a bit defensively.

“We have a great society out here,” says Douglas Teel, a Davenport dentist who plays the role of Max Detweiler. “We’re not just a bunch of hicks.”

“I’m just amazed by the talent in (Lincoln) county,” Doug Mielke says.

By day, Mielke is a wheat farmer and cattle rancher. But he’s so devoted to the stage he grew a Hitler moustache for his role as a Nazi sympathizer. Most of his family will either be on stage or backstage.

His day job, he says, provides abundant practice time. “I can rehearse my lines without inhibitions. I have the wide open spaces.”

The musical’s male lead, Capt. Georg von Trapp, is Paul McLain, a lanky Davenport doctor who still makes house calls and seems to have delivered half the von Trapp kids.

“I do this because it allows me to be somebody else for a while,” he says.

Preparations in the weight room wrap up as curtain time nears. The cast gathers on the high school basketball court, grabs hands and listens to McLain pray.

“Lord, your K/P players are here before you again,” says McLain, a lay minister.

The troupe drops hands and scurries off for last-minute warmups. A gaggle of nuns in black habits wanders through the gym with lighted candles, ready for the opening scene at Nonnberg Abbey.

On the other side of the curtain, a standing-room-only crowd has gathered. Some drove more than an hour to get here.

The first three shows have been sellouts, or nearly so. The ticket line forms outside the high school multipurpose room two hours before the show.

“This community supports everything,” says Gabriella McDonald, a Davenport home-care worker waiting in line for a $10 ticket. “People circle the wagons. And you don’t have many choices, unless you want to drive to Spokane.”

The orchestral ensemble warms up, led by pianist Sarah Jane Johnson. Stagehands shush actor-kids in the weight room as the school’s worn blue curtain rises.

“I’m not nervous, just excited,” Knapp says. “I’ve done this too many times to get nervous.”