Narnia: The Musical

Last weekend, the final special event the hubby and I attended was our church's production of "Narnia: The Musical."  Although I reported on this last year at this time (our church typically does its Christmas productions two years in a row, and you can read that post here ), we decided to go again as we had heard they had upgraded the makeup, scenery, and special effects.  We took our 8-year-old grandtwins along with us, who also had seen it last year, but enjoyed the show so much they were eager to go again.

I'm always impressed with our theater team's attention to detail.  And that - a standard of excellence - is probably why 4400 others came this year to see one of the six showings of "Narnia."  The word is obviously out in our area that this church does a Broadway quality show each year.

Several things were different this year from last year's production.

First we were greeted by newspaper carriers dressed in clothing from the 40's era.  We received a paper with news of Thursday, July 6, 1944.  One advertisement in the paper was for Turkish Delight candy, which we were able to purchase on the concessions table in the lobby.

The entire lobby area had been transformed into a winter wonderland scene to correlate with the Narnia's winter theme.  Entire walls were covered with winter scene murals and a multitude of sparkling trees were decorated throughout the lobby and halls.

Brianna and Tori prior to the show.

For the hour before each performance, a big band was set up at the one end of the entrance area and played popular 1940's era Big Band tunes.

As folks entered and waited in line for the theater doors to open, they enjoyed hearing Tommy Gee and the Clef Notes play many familiar tunes.

Son Caleb played his trumpet in the ensemble, and had numerous solos throughout the gig.

  This band contained a combination of church and community members who had met and rehearsed for a number of months prior to the production weekend.  They played an hour of tunes prior to each of the six performances throughout the weekend.

Caleb had double duty - following each big band performance, he headed up onto the main stage to open the Narnia show.  After greeting the audience and giving a few basic instructions, he presented a brief explanation of the true meaning of Narnia.  Narnia is an allegory in which the characters and story mirrorthe story of Jesus in the Bible, and the drama team wanted that to be fully understood by each audience member.

Some views of the scenery:

Castle of the evil White Witch

Cair Paravel - castle of good Narnians

The children's country boarding home

At intermission we sampled some authentic Turkish Delight candy, which is actually a minor part in the story plot.  The production crew had ordered it in for the show from the one and only candy company in the entire United States that makes authentic Turkish Delight.

A few more scenes from the land of Narnia:

This year the production crew added "flyers" to the performance.  Audience members were spellbound as various characters flew through the air.  The white witch, one of the flyers, met her demise when she was thrown from her castle through the air to her death by the good Aslan, the lion.

One thing that I think is so commendable about these performances is how the cast members and crew mingle with the guests out in the lobby after the show.  Of course the girls wanted to have some photos with both the lovable and not-so-lovable characters.  

Aslan the lion

The White Witch

One of the White Witch's wolves

Father Christmas

The White Stag

And finally the Eagle, who so generously allowed the girls to each pluck one of his sleeve feathers to take home as a souvenir.  Wow, did that make them smile!

After this year's extravaganza, I will be anxious to see what show the team picks for next year.  If there is one thing that's certain, it will be an awesomely done production illustrating a very timely message.  

I wish you all could be there to see it.