Ever since the Dec. 3 opening of the Whitefish Theatre Company’s holiday production “Mary Poppins,” there’s been a bit of Edwardian magic in the air at the O’Shaughnessy Center. It likely has something to do with local actors Amy Chisholm and Mikey Winn, who take to imagined London skies as the magical nanny Mary Poppins and chimneysweep Bert, Mary’s wise, cheeky friend.
In classic Mary Poppins form, Chisholm glides on and off stage with her iconic umbrella throughout the second act. Winn never floats through the sky, but he does take a merry jaunt up the side of the stage to dance across the underside of the ceiling and skip back down to the stage floor during “Step in Time,” one of many delightful group musical numbers in the show.
Such a feat would seem routine to the chimneysweep who shares some of Poppins’ mysterious magic, but it’s a novel act here in the Flathead, where no actor has ever before walked upside down, dangling inverted in the air, during a performance.
Chisholm and Winn’s airborne adventures are made possible by ZFX, the Las Vegas-based complete service provider for flying effects that the Whitefish Theatre Co. hired in 2008 to help produce Peter Pan, the first Flathead Valley show featuring flying actors.
“We are a company of ‘firsts,’ you might say!” wrote Artistic Director Jesse DeVine in an email.
ZFX flying producers came to Whitefish in the weeks leading up to the show’s opening to install on the O’Shaughnessy Center’s ceiling the complicated rigging systems that hoists Chisholm and Winn. ZFX specialists also spent two days training the actors in flight and showing the theater company’s tech department and volunteer flight crew how to work the system during performances.
Bert displays his magic during “Step in Time,” a song that gives Jane and Michael Banks, played by Eloise McKeon and Jackson Schindler, a glimpse of life broader and more beautiful than what they’ve experienced in their small, grounded, and privileged existence as children of English banker George Banks, played by Christoph Lawton, and his wife Winifred, played by Charity Ambrose.
And though Poppins and her umbrella lift off multiple times during the show, her most theatric flight precedes “Anything Can Happen,” the closing song with the inspirational refrain, “If you reach for the heavens, you get the stars thrown in.”
“When most people hear ‘Mary Poppins,’ they think of the unbelievably beautiful movie with Julie Andrews,” DeVine said earlier this year. “‘Anything Can Happen’ is not from the movie, but I think it is truly inspirational and it hits my heart every time I hear it.”
The songs opens with a precious line from Jane and Michael – “You can be a butterfly,” he begins, “Or just stay a larva!” she finishes, wiggling across the stage like a bug – who have finally and completely learned the lessons and family values that Mary came into their lives to teach.
The entire 33-person cast joins Mary Poppins and the Banks family to belt the song’s culminating choruses that celebrate choosing the super over the superficial and chasing one’s dreams – something nobody ever regrets.
“Life throws challenges at all of us,” DeVine wrote about the song in an email. “When this happens, our tendency is to hold on for dear life. We think by holding tighter, we’ll be able to better control the outcome. But as life soon teaches us, we can’t control what happens to us. So the best course of action is to instead let go. Within the song ‘Anything Can Happen,’ the lyrics continue, ‘if you let it.’ The song drives home the need for us all to … start believing that the universe is working toward our greatest good, no matter how arduous or unfair our current circumstances seem. In the script, the members of the Banks family each struggle with this concept in different ways. Mary Poppins and Bert slowly succeed in helping them to let go, and by so doing, all that is good in their lives begin to flourish and grow.”
And as the song concludes, Mary Poppins takes flight one last time to be carried by the West Winds into the lives of the next family in need, confident that she’s leaving behind a loving family with a regained sense of priority.
Shows are at 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 11-12 and 18-19; and at 4 p.m. on Dec. 13 and 20. All seats are reserved. Tickets are $22 for adults, $20 for seniors, and $8 for students. Buy tickets online at whitefishtheatreco.org or by calling (406) 862-5371.