Notes from James Yeara, Director

“When the dog bites, /when the bee stings, /when I’m feeling sad,/
I simply remember my favorite things, /then I don’t feel so bad.”

One of the most popular stage musicals of all-time and a box-office champion as well as ”Best Picture” Oscar winner as a film, some people do hate The Sound of Music, calling it “The Sound of Muzak” or similar puns, finding the show saccharine, unrealistic, and untruthful.

I have never been one of them.

But the musical does stretch the truth. The musical’s “Maria Rainer” was actually “Maria Kutschera,” the German poet supposedly more pleasing than her real last name. Maria Kutschera grew up as a socialist and an atheist. She wasn’t a paragon of patience and good cheer. Georg Von Trapp’s first wife was an English woman whose father was ironically the inventor of the torpedo; Von Trapp would eventually become a decorated WWI Austrian submarine captain against the British. The couple did have seven children: Rupert, Agathe, Maria, Franziska, Werner, Hedwig, Johanna, and the littlest one in curls, Martina. After the death of his first wife, Captain Von Trapp did pull a move straight out of Jane Eyre and marry the governess in 1927, and they subsequently had three more children, embarking on a world tour singing years before Hitler came to power in Germany; there was always music in the Von Trapp villa. Thus Maria and the Captain didn’t marry just before the Nazis “forced” the Anchluss in 1938, and the Von Trapps certainly didn’t climb the Austrian Alps to escape them; if they had, they would have ended up in Berchtesgaden, Hitler’s summer retreat, as the actual Von Trapps wryly pointed out from Vermont when The Sound of Music movie was released in 1965.

But as in life, the truth never gets in the way of a good story, (which people would rather believe) and The Sound of Music is a very good story. There’s a karmic balance in directing this musical after directing Macbeth in the fall with some of the same student actors; Shakespeare’s Macbeth takes a good king and makes him a by-word for ambitious evil.

And that’s ok. This musical deserves its popularity, maybe more so in this its 50th anniversary year. The Von Trapps did ultimately leave Austria rather than capitulate to the Nazis. Georg Von Trapp did reject the narcissistic dilettante who believed the whole world revolved around her, and who believed that no problem couldn’t be appeased with a smile and more decorating. The Von Trapps did win first prize in the Salzburg Folk Festival. “Doe” is still a deer, a female deer, and ray is still a drop of golden sun.

And I defy anyone not to shed an honest tear or two during “Climb Ev’ry Mountain” or “Edelweiss” or “Something Good” or during one of the great songs from the greatest duo in musical history. It’s ok. Kleenexes will be available during intermission and after the show.

20 years ago today was the last time I directed The Sound of Music at BCHS. Students then were much as they are now, and Bethlehem has always had some great students. Dan Ibanez is a senior who has worked on building and painting sets, mastering the lights and sound system, becoming a whiz of multi-media over the past four years, all the while shuttling down to the middle school from September through February to build the sets for the middle school musicals. While you won’t see him in the excellent cast onstage, Dan’s story has been a good one, and his contributions have made shows both here and at the middle school “a few of my favorite things.” When you applaud the cast at the end of the performance, you’re also applauding the efforts and talents of the dedicated crew who built the sets, painted them, hung and gelled the lights, worked the sound levels, managed the stage, and kept the props and costumes going to the right actors, all with the same passion and focus on the performance as the actors. It’s all one production, so please clapped extra loud so those backstage can hear you, too.

Year after year Debi Karpowitz would leap into the breach when work on a show had to been done, or students loitering off-stage had to be supervised; Debi functioned as a de facto executive producer/art director/costumer/”what needs doing-I’ve done it” whirlwind. Debi never volunteered her words; her advice has been sought after on the sets, the casting, the props, stage management, and costumes. She not only did her work, but often picked up the slack when someone else proved to be more talk and less timely results. Long after her own children graduated, Debi has worked long and hard on BCHS musicals and Shakespeare productions to make them successful learning experiences for students, keeping the focus truly on the student leaning without need of megaphone, “hanging out time with her ‘kids,’” or other such grandstanding. Debi’s dedication, talent, and effectiveness are in rare supply, and they beg for a special thank you after all these years.