Merrimack Middle-Schoolers Perform ‘The Secret Garden’

MERRIMACK, NH — Merrimack middle-schoolers have been practicing and performing their spring play in recent weeks which will be presented on Friday and Saturday. The students are performing “The Secret Garden,” the musical by Frances Burnett about a young woman coming of age in the Victoria-era.

According to director Jeffrey Caron, a science teacher at the school, the students were working hard to put the complicated and intricate show together.

“This is an exceptional group,” he said. “This is an exceptional show. This one is really hard. We’ve been saving it and waiting for a group that could handle it. They are working really hard … they go home and they learn their stuff.”

Scheduling, he noted, had been difficult – trying to get access to the performance space, getting all of the actresses and actors to find time to practice, as well as volunteers, to bring the production together.

Caron added that while the entire cast were performing well, one student, Kaitlin Lavallee, who plays Lily, was a surprise this season.

“She was in the ensemble of the fall play,” he stated, “and we had no idea … she’s shy and then, she came out, and got to sing, and it was crazy.”

The play is also hitting home with some of the students because it was about a child of a similar age growing up in difficult circumstances.

“It’s perfect for families because this is about the kid growing up,” he said. “It’s a metaphor … winter going into spring; the garden going from dead to alive. It’s really about this little girl growing up and finding herself.

Performances will be held at the middle school at 7 p.m. on Friday, March 24, 2017, and Saturday, March 25.

Watch a short clip from the rehearsals last week here:

For tickets on Friday, click here; for tickets on Saturday, click here.

Synopsis

Frances Hodgson Burnett’s beloved Victorian classic, “The Secret Garden,” blossoms anew in this enchanting musical. When young Mary Lennox loses her parents to a cholera outbreak in India, she is sent to live with her uncle, hermit Archibald Craven, who lives in an imposing, secluded manor on the British heath. Inside the haunting house upon the hill, Mary finds a reclusive, long-suffering collection of souls. Since her aunt Lily’s death, Mary’s uncle has pushed away his surviving loved ones, leaving his bedridden son, Colin, alone. Sickly Colin, hidden away in the depths of the manner, bears the guilt of his mother’s death on his crippled shoulders. When Mary discovers her Aunt Lily’s hidden garden, locked shot and overgrown with vines, stubborn Mary is determined to revive the beauty that once was. Surrounded by spirits from the past, who both warn and welcome her, determined Mary begins to peel away the layers of sadness that cover the house and the garden, showing us the power that “one small girl” can have when she “wants things to grow.”

The cast

Mary Lennox: Ruby Wilson

Lily Craven: Kaitlin Lavallee

Archibald Craven: Alex Pittman

Dr. Neville Craven: Gabriel Victal

Colin Craven: Jacob Gaudet

Mrs. Medlock: Nadia Herold

Martha Sowerby: Tegan Lajoie

Dickon Sowerby: John Hilliard

Ben Weatherstaff: Max Hayes-Hunsicker

Albert Lennox: Gavin Kurdek

Rose Lennox: Brianna Bigelow

The Ayah: Ariel DeVietro

The Fakir: Hannah Stone

Lt. Wright: Blake Sawyer

Lt. Shaw: Jacob Linn

Major Holmes: Shea Ferguson

Claire: Ashley Farrar

Alice: Sydney Pynenburg

Mrs. Winthrop: Olivia Stuart

The ensemble cast

Sophia Amblo, Emma Chaplin, Marissa Lee Horton, Katrina Hoppe, Lillian McDonough, Lexi Pereira, Olivia Sorensen, Samantha Summerfield, Brianna Watson, Mariah Wells, and Elizabeth Wylie.