The Langley Secondary School gym will be a transformed into an underwater world for the musical Little Mermaid.
The show will feature about 30 students on stage, another half dozen handling backstage and technical duties, and an orchestra consisting of a student, staff, former students and community members.
A former drama teacher and the music director choose the play and teacher Khaila Piorecky has wholeheartedly taken up the mantle.
“They were looking for something family oriented and upbeat,” she said.
Little Mermaid is the tale of Ariel, King Triton’s youngest daughter.
She has fallen in love with a human who lives in the world above the waves and decides she wants to make a life there with him.
Ariel must make a bargain with the evil sea witch, Ursula, to trade her mermaid’s tail for legs.
Ursula, of course, betrays the bargain, and Ariel needs the help of her undersea friends Flounder the fish, Scuttle the seagull, and Sebastian the crab.
But this a show for little children, isn’t it?
Piorecky said the high school students loved the movie and the choice of the musical.
“The kids lost their minds when they found out it was Little Mermaid,” Piorecky said.
The high school students love staging anything Disney and the school lucked into being in the enviable position of selecting a production just when the Little Mermaid school production came available.
“It just got released so we’re pretty excited. We’re the first one in Langley to do it,” she noted.
She added there is a big change from the original movie script compared to the stage musical. When Ariel’s love, Prince Eric, asks her father for permission to take her to live with him on land, her father’s reply is more modern – “She can speak for herself.”
“That was a cool new twist,” Piorecky said. “It was less old school where fathers spoke for their daughters and daughters really didn’t have a voice”
Little Mermaid runs Feb. 24 and 25, and March 2, 3, and 4. Showtimes are 7 p.m. with 2 p.m. matinees on Feb. 25 and March 4.
Tickets are $12 for adults. Students and seniors pay $10 and tickets for children 10 and younger cost $8.
The show is about two hours with an intermission and there’s a concession.
To reserve tickets, call 604-534-4171, ext. 743 or online at sd35.schoolcashonline.co.
