NICEVILLE — When “Fiddler on the Roof” opened Sept. 22, 1964, it ran 3,242 performances before closing almost eight years later. It was revived four times on the Great White Way alone and has had thousands of productions around the world.

Now, the latest national tour of the show that brought such Broadway standards as “If I Were a Rich Man,” “Tradition,” “Sunrise, Sunset” and “Matchmaker, Matchmaker” comes Dec. 3 to the Mattie Kelley Arts Center.

A full-scale musical masterpiece, the professional touring production features a crew of 67 actors, musicians and technical staff to recreate and populate Anatevka, a poor Russian Jewish village in 1905, on the Russian Revolution’s eve.

Times, they are a-changing, even for the village’s sheltered people.

“Fiddler” has stolen audiences’ hearts all over the world with its humor, warmth and honesty. Based on Sholom Aleichem’s stories, it has a rousing, heartwarming score and timeless songs as Tevye, a poor milkman, tries to keep his family and village’s beloved traditions and faith strong despite a changing world.

With memorable, hummable tunes by Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick, Broadway legend Hal Prince directed and choreographed the original production.

In the production coming to Northwest Florida State, veteran Broadway actors Jimmy Ferraro and Dee Etta Rowe, who have actually been married to each other for 25 years, just like their characters, will play the starring roles of Tevye and his wife Goldie.

With its warmth and sometimes rousing, sometimes heartfelt numbers, “Fiddler on the Roof” is a celebration of “Tradition” and a salute “To Life.”

La chaim!

Want to go?

The national “Fiddler on the Roof” tour plays at 7:30 p.m. Dec. 3 at Northwest Florida State College’s Mattie Kelley Arts Center. Tickets are $45 each from the box office by phone, online or in person. Call 729-6000 or see www.mattiekellyartscenter.org.

Contact News Bulletin Arts & Entertainment Editor Brian Hughes at 850-682-6524 or brianh@crestviewbulletin.com. Follow him on Twitter @cnbBrian.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: PREVIEW: ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ coming Dec. 3 to Niceville

When I was in Vermont, I never had apple pie. But the name just sounds autumnal, doesn’t it?

You can cheat and buy a package of two 9-inch pre-made piecrusts. But given time, it’s a feeling of deep satisfaction to make your own.

CRUST 3 cups plain flour 1½ tsp salt 3 tbsp sugar 1 cup Crisco (from experience, I learned to not substitute a store brand for the real thing when dealing with shortening) 1/3 cup ice water

Toss the flour, salt and sugar to mix. Cut it together using a wire pastry blender or two knives until it “looks like coarse meal.” (I had no idea what that meant, but all the recipes say to do it. It means to make it chunky.)

Sprinkle with some water. Start gathering it together with a fork, then give up, stick your hands in, and work it into smooth dough. (Make sure you wash your hands first, though.)

Divide the dough into two balls, one slightly bigger than the other one. Roll it out between two sheets of floured wax paper.

FILLING 2½-3 pounds Granny Smith apples, peeled and sliced ½ to 2/3 cup brown sugar 1 tsp cinnamon 1/8 tsp salt ¼ cup flour 2 tbsp butter

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

Line a 9-inch pie pan with the larger of the two crusts you rolled out. I found it easier to position the crust if it is on the bottom sheet of wax paper, which you invert and then peel off.

Mix the sliced apples with the sugar, cinnamon, salt and flour. Pour it into the pie shell and dot with slices of butter.

Cover with the top piecrust. Trim off the excess dough, and then pinch the edges together. Poke vent holes in the top. (Mom always made the letter “A” for apple. I assume it was apple, anyway.)

To make the pie festive, make autumn leaves and arrange on top. Mix in a bit of yellow food coloring in half the remaining dough and some red coloring in the other. The only practical way of doing so is with your hands. Be prepared to have yellow and red fingers for two days.

Using leaf-shaped cookie cutters or a sharp knife, cut out several red and yellow leaves and arrange them on top of the pie. Mix the remaining bits of red and yellow dough together to make orange dough and repeat. Draw “veins” in the leaves with the sharp knife.

You can also make an egg wash (some egg mixed with a bit of water) and paint it over the pie. That’ll give it a nice shine when it’s done baking.

Bake about 45 minutes. Halfway through, cover the edges with aluminum foil so they don’t burn.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: CULINARY ARTS: Vermont apple pie

I love good Southern cornbread dressing, but being from points north, my Yankee genes sometimes ache for breadcrumb stuffing. With Turkey Day being hectic, here’s how I cheat and still serve up a great dish of stuffing that even my Crestview-born roommate grudgingly admits is pretty tasty.

2 boxes turkey flavor stuffing mix 1 pound bulk mild Italian sausage (or four sausages with the skin pulled off and meat crumbled) 1 large onion 3 cups chicken broth to replace water in stuffing mix directions Olive oil Parsley, sage and thyme to taste (if you’re a Simon and Garfunkel fan, feel free to add rosemary)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Dice the onion. Sauté the sausage and the onion in a tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat.

Heat the chicken broth in a microwave or pan to almost boiling. Mix in the stuffing mix, and add the sausage and onions. Season to taste.

Pour the mixture into a 9- by 13-inch baking dish. Bake for about 20 minutes until top turns brown.

Contact News Bulletin Arts & Entertainment Editor Brian Hughes at 850-682-6524 or brianh@crestviewbulletin.com. Follow him on Twitter @cnbBrian.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: CULINARY ARTS: Yankee stuffing

CRESTVIEW — The production of “Arsenic and Old Lace” by the new community theatre troupe is more than a delightful evening of murder, mayhem and elderberry wine. It is a significant milestone in the north county’s cultural life, marking the return of community theatre. That the show is sheer delight from start to finish is just the icing on the cake.

Joseph Kesselring’s magnificent black comedy has delighted American theatre audiences for decades. With its old-timey, stately veneer, it’s tempting to think you’re about to settle in for an evening of dated drama and hokey jokes that might have evoked howls in the 1940s but just seem dumb today. Not so. 

Kesselring’s tale of gracious murderesses, their frazzled, recently engaged nephew, his preacher’s daughter fiancée, his gangster brother, a mad plastic surgeon, another sibling who thinks he’s Teddy Roosevelt, and a cop on the beat who’d rather be a playwright, remains as fun and fresh today as when it was written in 1940.

The as-yet unnamed Crestview community theatre group bringing it to life on the Warriors Hall stage has done a marvelous job of evoking the ambience of an old Brooklyn house. The set, under the direction of Eric Wintersteen, is perfectly overdecorated with ample opportunities for exits and entrances, door slamming and Teddy Roosevelt’s frequent charges up the San Juan Hill of the main staircase.

Coupled with delightful costuming and makeup, the visual appeal of the show is as important as the acting, and for the most part, the performers were bang on target. Particularly enjoyable is Sandra Peters as spinster Abby Brewster. I’ve been dying to see Sandra act since she first arrived in Crestview and told me she’d been on New York stages.

We were delighted with the performance of Crestview High School senior Jack Barr as the frazzled Mortimer, theatre critic nephew who discovers Abby and her sister, Martha, played convincingly by Asleigh Gonyea, have been performing acts of mercy by poisoning lonely old men seeking to rent a room in their rambling old home.

“This has developed into a very bad habit,” Mortimer tells his aunties when he learns they have buried 12 victims in the basement.

Jeremy Faust was particularly well cast as evil brother Jonathan Brewster, who returns after 20 years of gangsterhood around the world. The role was originated by Boris Karloff, hence multiple references to the famed Universal Pictures monster actor. As plastic surgeon Dr. Einstein, Ronald Walker seemed to channel Peter Lorre, who made the role famous in the 1944 film, bringing the character lots of delightful menace.

Sean Peters, Sandra Peters’ husband, as the play-writing policeman Officer O’Hara, and Teagan Faust as Mortimer’s  fiancée Elaine, topped the list of favorite performers.

A few technical glitches were ably covered, including Walker quipping, “Must be a short” and banging the wall when a lighting miscue caused a flicker. 

I might also gently offer a criticism about the casting of Officer Brophy, ably played by Victoria Martin who butched up her performance of what is usually a male role. Next time, just make it a female patrolman. There’s always an element of distraction when a member of the opposite sex plays a role meant for the other.

But that little bone is minor. Overwhelmingly the evening was a delight. Filled seats in Warriors Hall indicated the community craves live theatre, even when two shows were running simultaneously, as happened last weekend. And now that we know the hall in the Whitehurst Municipal Building can accommodate theatricals, it’s time for the city to put in some theatrical lighting. It’ll only increase the value of Warriors Hall as a community resource.

And, from a purely selfish standpoint, I can’t wait to see the hall enhanced for our new community theatre troupe’s next production. If it’s anything like “Arsenic and Old Lace,” it’ll be another sell-out.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: 'Arsenic' marks return of Crestview theatre: Review

I love high school theatre. I love seeing the kids up on the stage indulging in that ultimate fantasy: to become, for just a couple hours, an entirely different person and live that person’s life, speak that person’s words and feel — and emote — that person’s emotions. 

The more students I see populating a stage, the more I love the show because it means all the more young people being exposed to one of the most embracing of the performing arts. Each of them, no matter how seemingly small the role, knows their character is an integral part of the story and has made the decision to commit himself or herself to the success of the evening. And such is the case with “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the beloved Frank Capra film unfolding in real life on the Pear Tyner Auditorium stage at Crestview High School.

Director and drama teacher Annette Gebhardt has assembled a likable, enthusiastic cast of 43 students, ranging in age from middle school to kids from her own high school classes. Together the youthful performers become the population of Bedford Falls and share in the telling of the story of George Bailey as he approaches the most critical night of his life.

The minimalist streetscape set — whether intentional or not — effectively turned the focus of the performance almost exclusively on the young performers and their story, and was far more effective than had every store’s façade been rendered in minute detail.

Many of the young thespians who appear in the play are old friends from previous productions. It’s always fun to see them mature as actors before many of them, bitten by the stage bug, move on to major in theatre in college. But in this early stage of their careers, it’s a rare treat indeed when a couple suddenly find that magic whatsis and make the transition from kid-acting-a-part to actor-being-a-character.

In “It’s a Wonderful Life,” that has happened to Ryan Vance, who plays George Bailey, and Brittany Agee, who plays his longtime girlfriend and then wife, Mary Hatch Bailey. Somewhere, shortly after the curtain opened on Act II, I was no longer watching another enjoyable performance by Ryan and Brittany. I was watching George and Mary’s soap opera of a life, and both young performers are to be commended for making that critical leap into actorhood.

There were other standouts in the show that contributed to the large audience’s enjoyment of the familiar holiday favorite. Mac Sticha as the angel (second class, sans wings) Clarence Odbody and his brother, Zac Sticha, as Uncle Billy both played critical roles and ably plunged into their parts. While one can’t help but compare their performances to those of Henry Travers and Thomas Mitchell in the 1946 film, it was satisfying to see the boys making a conscientious effort to interpret the characters in their own way, just as Ryan and Brittany divorced themselves from James Stewart and Donna Reed’s performances.

Other standouts included Briana Schiro as Violet Peterson, Courtney Jones as Aunt Tilly, Jonathan Baughman as Mr. Potter, and Alex Andrews and Jeff Linares as Bert and Ernie. It was great to see the quartet of youngsters playing George and Mary’s kids — Abby Keiffer, Ty Gebhardt, Vince Lancaster and Emily Keiffer —  adding a bit of age appropriateness to the roles. As much as I willingly suspend reality when attending student productions, it’s always toughest trying to reconcile a high school student portraying a young ‘un against his peers. 

Kudos to Gebhardt for not just adding this enjoyable touch, but also for giving younger kids a taste of the footlights. With her daughter Madeline as assistant director, Bridget Worth as tech director and a tech crew list as long as the cast list (including a couple guys manhandling the Frankensteinian light cage: won’t some wealthy alumnus please donate some decent tech equipment for these stellar productions?), “It’s a Wonderful Life” is a wonderful evening of local theatre. 

How wonderful? I got sniffy and teary-eyed at the warmhearted ending. That means everybody on the stage was doing their job.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: 'A Wonderful Life' at Crestview High: Review

NICEVILLE — Part romance, part twisted fairy tale, and all irreverent fun for everyone, “Shrek: The Musical” runs 7:30 p.m. at the Mattie Kelly Arts Center. The national touring Broadway show brings characters from the Oscar-winning DreamWorks animated film to the stage in a family-friendly production.

Noted by critics as “good-hearted and warped just enough,” this 2009 musical comedy tells the tale of Shrek, a swamp-dwelling ogre, who goes on a life-changing adventure to reclaim his swamp’s deed. Along the way, a wisecracking donkey who soon becomes his best friend joins the unlikely hero. He also fights a fearsome dragon, rescues the feisty princess Fiona and learns that real friendship and true love aren't only found in fairy tales.

Tickets cost $45 each and are available from the box office by phone, online or in-person. Contact 729-6000 or visit www.mattiekellyartscenter.org

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: ‘Shrek: The Musical’ Nov. 19 in Niceville

NICEVILLE — The Northwest Florida Ballet will once again grace the stage with visions of dancing sugar plums, graceful snow flurries and magical dolls in its 32nd annual presentation of “The Nutcracker.” Performances will be at the Mattie Kelly Arts Center at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 17 and 2:30 p.m. Nov. 18. Tickets are $28 for adults and $14 for children 12 and under and are available online at www.nfballet.org or by calling 664-7787.

“The Nutcracker”has been an annual favorite for thousands of families all over the world. Although it was first performed to Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s captivating score in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1892, the first American production of the ballet wasn’t introduced until 1944 by the San Francisco Ballet.

In addition to more than 100 company dancers, including Ellie Borick dancing Clara and Lucas Meyers playing the high-spirited Fritz, principal guest artists Zoica Tovar and Andres Estevez of BalletMet, Columbus, Ohio, will perform the leading roles of the Sugar Plum Fairy and Cavalier.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: ‘The Nutcracker’ Nov. 17 & 18 at arts center

CRESTVIEW — When Abbie and Martha Brewster toddled into their living room on a recent afternoon, they had to abruptly stop in their tracks. The actresses playing the spinster sisters had forgotten there had been a set reconfiguration.

“We just have to adjust to a door move,” Sandra Peters, who plays Abbie, said. “We had to move it from there (pointing stage right) to there (stage left).”

She and Ashleigh Gonyea ran back to their marks as actors Sean Peters, Sandra’s husband, and Jack Barr, a Crestview High School senior, delivered the women’s cue again.

Such are the challenges of bringing a play off the script’s pages and onto the stage, and Crestview’s fledgling community theatre members take in stride whatever hiccups occur before the opening night curtain.

“Arsenic and Old Lace,” the classic American dark comedy of gangsters, spinster murderesses and a loony brother who thinks he’s Teddy Roosevelt, runs 7:30 p.m. Nov. 16-17 and 3 p.m. Nov. 16 at Warriors Hall, 201 Stillwell Ave. Tickets – which cost $10 for adults, $5 for kids under 12 — are available at Journey Java Connection in Crestview, at the door before performances or by calling 398-8814.

The Peterses are the driving force behind the troupe’s formation. When the couple arrived in Crestview following Sean Peters’ assignment to start Journey Methodist Church, they were surprised to discover their new home lacked community theatre, Sandra, “Arsenic’s” assistant director, said.

After helping in the spring Crestview High School drama production of “The Sound of Music,” the couple marshaled supporters and launched the community-wide troupe.

“We’re not even legit yet,” Sandra Peters said, laughing. “We haven’t even thought of a name.”

A week before the curtain rises Nov. 16, the cast is off-book, she said. While actors rehearse in the back meeting room at the couple’s coffee shop, crewmembers have built sets for today’s move-in at Warriors Hall.

“The pieces we build are pieces we can reuse in future productions, so it’ll be a good investment,” Sandra Peters said.

Local reaction to the community theatre troupe’s formation has been positive, she said.

“I just had a couple come in here and buy tickets,” Sandra Peters said. “They asked where the proceeds are going and we said they’re going to start a Crestview community theatre and they said, ‘Oh gosh, we’ve needed that.’ We’ve heard that from everybody. We’ve also heard from people who are interested in being actors or helping on the crew, so that’s been good, too.”

If producing a show isn’t complicated enough, doing so while launching a theatrical production company is an even greater challenge, Peters said.

“We are jumping over hurdles. It’s sometimes a little frustrating but we’ll get through it,” she said. “We’d just love to have a space that would be more suitable, but we’re making do with what we have. But we would eventually love to have a space that better suits us.”

The Peterses have visited the historic Fox Theatre downtown and covet its large stage, spacious wings, dressing rooms and fly space. However, the building is still undergoing renovation by owner Mickey Rytman, and may not be completed for a couple of years, Sandra Peters said.

Meanwhile, she said in true theatre spirit, “the show will go on” wherever the new company can find performance space — with sponsors’ backing.

“The main thing is to get this show done and out there and show the public what we can do and then get some support,” Sandra Peters said.

Contact News Bulletin Arts & Entertainment Editor Brian Hughes at 850-682-6524 or brianh@crestviewbulletin.com. Follow him on Twitter @cnbBrian.

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: ‘Arsenic and Old Lace’ could restart Crestview community theatre

I didn’t mean to be a James Bond enthusiast. I never thought I’d drop quotes from 007 films in conversation with fellow enthusiasts, or have one-sheets from Bond films on the wall of my office, or make a mix of dinner music from Bond film soundtracks to play when we have guests to supper.

Lately I've been driving my colleagues Bond-crazy, playing the soundtrack albums, redecorating the men's bathroom with vintage 007 film lobby cards, browbeating our poor editor, Thomas Boni, until he'd let me run a James Bond trivia contest in the paper. But hey, a new Bond film only comes along every two or three years. I've got my tickets for "SkyFall" already.

Maybe it’s my parents’ fault. They gave me an Airfix model of James Bond’s Aston Martin DB5, complete with functioning gadgets, for my 10th birthday. (I made a horrible muddle of it, starting with accidentally gluing down the ejector seat. If I had just left it in the box untouched, it’d be worth a fortune today.)

Mom inadvertently got me reading the original Ian Fleming novels when she gave me money to buy a German-English dictionary for my high school language class. There was a display of the film edition of “Diamonds Are Forever” by the front door of the bookshop and I bought that instead.

The first 007 film I ever saw was “Thunderball,” Sean Connery’s 1964 fourth outing as 007, which was broadcast by CBS-TV. (I still have the page from TV Guide in which it’s listed.) I started collecting the soundtrack albums, slipping my high school art teacher, Ms. Miles, cash from my job at the A&P to buy them when she’d go to the mall.

And then came college. Tulane University had one of the nation’s foremost student-run film boards, and was one of a handful of campuses across the country with 35mm projection capabilities and Dolby stereo sound. Perfect for, say, organizing a marathon showing of every Bond film in one weekend, which I did. (We even borrowed a Lotus Turbo Esprit from a local dealer to park in front of McAlister Auditorium.)

Rereading John Pearson’s “James Bond: The Authorized Biography of 007” my junior year, I discovered Bond’s birthday (Nov. 11) fell on a Saturday. A birthday party was in order. Invitations were sent out and about 25 friends crammed into my residence hall suite, appropriately festooned with Bond film posters.

I received a telegram from Albert R. Broccoli, the Bond film producer, expressing his regrets he and his crew couldn’t be in “wonderful New Orleans again” (they had shot “Live and Let Die” there in 1971) but wishing us a great evening. And we made Nell Nolan’s coveted social column in the Times-Picayune, right up there with all the snooty Uptown soirées.

Subsequent James Bond Birthday Parties grew in scope. George Lazenby, whose one appearance as 007 in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” made him an instant Trivial Pursuit question, appeared at one. So did Lois Maxwell, the original Miss Moneypenny, whom we took to Audubon Zoo during her visit, where she bought us hotdogs and ice cream. Two were held aboard streetcars chugging along St. Charles Avenue.

I’d like to think this Bond thing’s an innocent obsession, rather like collecting shot glasses or Bing & Grondahl Christmas plates. I’ve got tubes full of Bond film posters, editions of the novels in multiple languages (including Icelandic), 007 toys and games, and am hoping Santa brings me the new Blu-ray set of the all the movies.

But my interest in the character goes beyond the Aston Martins, Saville Row suits, Rolex watches and winsome lady friends. I suspect it has to do with Bond’s embodiment of the sort of quiet, no-nonsense hero who knows his duty and does it without much hoopla, sometimes getting his heart and body injured in the process.

Bond reminds me of men from the Great Generation, such as my dad, who marched off to World War II, as did Bond, recognizing it was their duty, not expecting any glory. Actually, someone expressed this better.

“He’s our modern-day version of the great heroes who appeared from time to time throughout history;…People who all went out and put their lives on the line for the cause of good,” President Ronald Reagan said in a 1983 Bond TV special. “James Bond is a man of honor. Maybe it sounds old-fashioned, but I believe he is a symbol of real value to the free world.”

Isn’t that the sort of hero we — and our kids — should be looking up to? Sometimes it seems there aren’t many left. But as long as one can walk up and say, “My name is Bond. James Bond,” there’s hope for the world.

Brian’s Bond Top 10

Favorite Bond book: From Russia, With Love

Favorite Bond film: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

Favorite Bond actor: George Lazenby

Favorite Bond theme song: You Only Live Twice (Nancy Sinatra)

Favorite Bond girl: Tracy DiVicenzo (Diana Rigg, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service)

Favorite Bond villain: Francisco Scaramanga (Christopher Lee, The Man With the Golden Gun)

Favorite Bond gadget: The Goldfinger Aston Martin DB5

Favorite Bond production design: You Only Live Twice

Favorite Bond dialogue: Bond: “You expect me talk?” Goldfinger: “No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die.”

Most abysmal Bond film: Quantum of Solace (Daniel Craig, 2008)

This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: COMMENTARY: James Bond and me