Canebrake Players announce auditions for summer musical

The Canebrake Players have announced auditions for the annual summer musical. This year’s production will be The Robber Bridegroom. Auditions will be held: Monday, May 18 a 6 p.m. and Tuesday, May 19 at 6 p.m. in the auditorium of the Old School on Main.

The actual production dates are July 24  thru July 27. The show will be directed by Raines Carr, who holds a Masters in Fine Arts from the University of Alabama and has worked in Hollywood and on Broadway.

There are singing and non-singing roles. Those interested in auditioning need to be prepared with 16 bars of their favorite song and/or a one-minute comedic monologue.  The Canebrake Players also need musicians and would like for them to be present at auditions as well. Instruments included in the show are banjos, fiddles, guitars and electric bass.

The musical is based on a novella written by Mississippi’s Eudora Welty. This bluegrass fairytale is loaded with innuendo, mistaken identities and wacky hijinx.

A rousing, Southern fairytale from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Driving Miss Daisy! The score is one of the only genuine bluegrass scores ever heard in a Broadway musical. Since opening on Broadway in 1975, The Robber Bridegroom has gone on to become a regional favorite.

Set in 18th century Mississippi, the show follows Jamie Lockhart, a rascally robber of the woods, as he courts Rosamund, the only daughter of the richest planter in the country. The proceedings go awry, however, thanks to a case of double-mistaken identity. Throw in an evil stepmother intent on Rosamund’s demise, her pea-brained henchman and a hostile talking head-in-a-trunk, and you have a rollicking country romp.