Coeur d’Alene Summer Theatre is ready to make it ‘Rain’

It is one of the greatest American movies ever made.

The American Film Institute in 2007 said so, ranking it behind only “Citizen Kane,” “The Godfather,” “Casablanca” and “Raging Bull” on its list of the 100 best films.

We’re talking “Singin’ in the Rain,” the 1952 musical starring Gene Kelly, Donald O’Connor and Debbie Reynolds. The plot is well known: Don Lockwood is silent film star who hates his co-star, Lina Lamont. When “The Jazz Singer” is released, Lockwood’s film studio decides to make a talkie too, starring their golden team of Lockwood and Lamont. The catch: Lina’s nasally voice is just … awful. Don and his friend Cosmo enlist a young singer, Kathy Selden, to dub Lina’s voice, without her knowledge. Mayhem – and romance – ensue.

Jadd Davis knows what’s at stake when taking on a piece of art so beloved.

“I’m terrified about it,” the artistic director of Coeur d’Alene Summer Theatre said with a laugh. “From the second I announced the show, all I’ve heard is ‘It’s my favorite musical.’ I’ve got to get it right.”

CST’s production of “Singin’ in the Rain” will open Thursday. There will be singing and tap dancing galore. Oh, and there will be rain.

“Making it rain is one of the easier things we can do,” said Davis, who is directing the production.

One of the harder things? Getting the casting just so. As Davis noted, Don Lockwood has be to handsome, charming and able to dance, the Kathy Selden has to have a lovely voice and be able to dance, and Cosmo Brown must be funny and be able to dance.

It’s the “able to dance” that can be a problem. “Singin’ in the Rain” is one of the most tap-heavy dance shows around.

“It took me two months from when I had auditions to finalize casting for this show,” Davis said. “I checked out markets in New York, Seattle, Portland, Alabama, L.A., our local scene. I ended up landing on three Seattle actors for the three lead roles.”

They are John David Scott as Don, Greg McCormick Allen as Cosmo, and as Kathy there’s Mallory King, who was Mary Poppins at CST two seasons ago.

“They’re the best,” Davis said. “I’m so star-struck that they’re on my stage.”

The stage musical, which premiered in London in 1983, hews “fairly darn close” to the movie, Davis said. One of the big differences is that in the stage version, Lina Lamont (Krista Curry) gets a full song. And Curry does awful singing really well. Davis said he first saw her play Lamont three years ago in Seattle.

“It’s incredible what she’s able to do with her voice,” he said. “I remember watching the performance of it, thinking ‘How do you actually sing a song and sound that bad and bring the house down?’ She did.”

One of the other challenges in this production involves making movies. For real. The plot features the films “The Royal Rascal,” and “The Dueling Cavalier,” later remade as “The Dancing Cavalier.” Davis and the actors spent two days – complete with sword fighting – filming those scenes, which will be projected during the show.

“They turned out great,” he said. It involved “staging the scenes for the film, doing all the work for the film, getting it out of the way, and then forgetting about it and going back to the show we’re doing. That has been the biggest technical challenge so far.”