{"id":409,"date":"2010-12-03T08:45:53","date_gmt":"2010-12-03T15:45:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=409"},"modified":"2010-12-03T08:45:53","modified_gmt":"2010-12-03T15:45:53","slug":"play-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2010\/12\/03\/play-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Play review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>In the photo from Off Stage Productions\u2019 latest play, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever<\/em>, Mrs. Bradley (Kim Snyder)\u00a0paces while on the phone as her family Charlie (Christopher Hattery), Beth (Jordan Ludwig) and Mr. Bradley (Larry Keltner) impatiently await their dinner.<\/strong> Photo by Jodi Hattery for the Van Wert independent<\/p>\n

Best Christmas Pageant<\/em> great fun<\/h1>\n

BARB THOMPSON\/<\/strong>Play Review<\/em><\/p>\n

When I was invited to attend the Wednesday night dress rehearsal of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever<\/em>, I decided to take advantage of the invite, as the weather was lousy and I hadn\u2019t anything else planned for the otherwise dreary evening.\u00a0The play is being presented at The Marsh Foundation Auditorium by Off Stage Productions.<\/p>\n

Wow!\u00a0Was I ever surprised!\u00a0First of all, I love kids \u2013 any age \u2013 but I would never have guessed that the 37-member cast would include 20-25 youngsters of all sizes and ages.\u00a0They were incredibly true to life in their parts and I didn\u2019t know, from one minute to the next, what was going to happen on stage.<\/p>\n

The main theme, of course, is the birth of the Christ Child and a small community\u2019s annual effort to portray the event in an acceptable way.\u00a0Adding a level of conflict to the picture for this year\u2019s pageant, however, is the inclusion of six kids \u2013 all from one family \u2013 who have a solid reputation for troublemaking.\u00a0They\u2019re the Herdmans!<\/p>\n

Earlier in the afternoon, I had watched a \u201cDr. Phil\u201d program on bullying and the Herdman kids fit every description of those TV rascals and more.\u00a0Therefore, I had double satisfaction when the stage Herdmans, right in front of my eyes, eventually fit into the hushed scenes of Christ\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n

The mother in the cast (Kim Snyder) is forced to direct the pageant at the last minute, so she\u2019s in for many surprises \u2026 especially when the Herdman family shows up.<\/p>\n

The play\u2019s producer is Toni Shema and Dan Bulau directed, ably assisted by Terri Stevens, Chad Kraner and Jan Miller.<\/p>\n

This is a pageant for the whole family and one that will be referred to (with smiles) for weeks.\u00a0It will be presented tonight and Saturday \u2013 both evenings at 8; also Sunday afternoon at 2.\u00a0Tickets are available at 211 S. Walnut St. between 10 a. m. and 6 p.m. today; there is a $3 cost for children 12 and under and $7 for adults.<\/p>\n

There are just three showings and local theatre fans don\u2019t want to miss it.\u00a0Those who attend might even be inspired to try the play with their own church children or maybe the neighborhood gang.\u00a0Kids are such a major part of the Christmas holiday and this story pretty much puts that into perspective.<\/p>\n

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever<\/em> could also be a gift to share with selected others and it won\u2019t even have to be wrapped.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the photo from Off Stage Productions\u2019 latest play, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, Mrs. Bradley (Kim Snyder)\u00a0paces while on the phone as her family Charlie (Christopher Hattery), Beth (Jordan Ludwig) and Mr. Bradley (Larry Keltner) impatiently await their dinner. Photo by Jodi Hattery for the Van Wert independent Best Christmas Pageant great fun BARB […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-26 05:49:07","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}