First showtime for Greenville Family Theater's production of 'Mary Poppins' next week

Jun. 29—The curtains of the Greenville Municipal Auditorium will open for the Greenville Family Theater's first performance of 'Mary Poppins' on Friday, July 8.

With about four months of intensive rehearsal behind them, many of the 50-plus cast members, aged 25 and younger, are playing multiple parts, with some even understudying for a different role in addition to the main ones for which they've been cast.

Led by director Jen Brown, who teaches math and theater arts at Greenville Christian School, the cast and crew is now putting the final touches on the show.

"If you're like me you enjoyed watching Mary Poppins when you were a kid with Julie Andrews and all the cool magic that went along with that," said Greenville Municipal Auditorium Manager Micah McBay. "That's what they're going to be doing right here, at the historic GMA."

Since 2015, Greenville Family Theater has maintained a reputation for staging elaborate, large scale musical productions like "Beauty and the Beast," "The Wizard of Oz" and "Singing in the Rain."

"Every summer, since 2015, we've put on a tremendous summer musical at the Greenville Municipal Auditorium with local talent, kids from age 25 and down, and have had amazing shows. The first one was 'Hello Dolly,'" said Greenville Family Theater Vice President Robert Smith, who co-founded the theater with his late wife, Kathleen Smith.

Although the theatrical company's productions have often boasted casts of 70 or more, the group had to regroup and reorganize in 2020 due to COVID-19 with a self-written, scored and produced musical that was performed for audiences over the Zoom teleconferencing ap. That year, the company was planning to perform "Annie," but the publishing company wouldn't give them permission to use Zoom for remote rehearsals.

"We finally realized that we weren't going to be able to do "Annie," and it broke my heart to do that when the kids already had their lines learned and everything," said Greenville Family Theater Creative Director Amy Hale, daughter of Robert and Kathleen Smith. "But, our cast and crew and people in the community were determined to do something, and that's how we came up with the idea for our production, 'Onto the Stage.'"

"The title was based off of the musical, 'Into the Woods,' and most of the songs were parodies of ones from musicals but with lyrics that had to do with life during the pandemic. Some of them are even parodies of songs from 'Annie,' like instead of 'It's a Hard Knock Life' we did 'It's a COVID Life,' and instead of 'You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile,' we did 'You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Mask.'"

In Summer 2021, as safety measures against COVID-19 loosened, Greenville Family Theater came back with a vengeance with a live production of "Newsies" that had a cast of more than 75.

Greenville Family Theater's production of "Mary Poppins" will star Mackenzie Hyde as Mary Poppins and Levi Smith as Poppins' friend/chimney sweep/jack of all trades Bert.

Show times for "Mary Poppins" will be as follows, with doors opening 45 minutes prior:

—7 p.m. Friday, July 8.

—1:30 p.m. Saturday, July 9.

—7 p.m. Saturday, July 9.

—7 p.m. Friday, July 15.

—1:30 p.m. Saturday, July 16.

—7 p.m. Saturday, July 16.

Tickets can be purchased online at www.ShowtimeAtTheGMA.com or at the box office at the Greenville Municipal Auditorium at 2821 Washington St.