The Rhythm Of The Rails

Music lends tempo to ‘The Boxcar Children’

Ethan Allen, Astrid Allen, Cora Ferguson, Bratcher Schilling and Alyssa White star in “The Boxcar Children” at Arts Live Theater in Fayetteville. The show runs through Sunday.
Ethan Allen, Astrid Allen, Cora Ferguson, Bratcher Schilling and Alyssa White star in “The Boxcar Children” at Arts Live Theater in Fayetteville. The show runs through Sunday.

Stephen Pigman says he's always conscious of a rhythm.

That might be expected for a musician, which Pigman is, but perhaps not for a director, which Pigman also is.

FAQ

‘The Boxcar Children’

WHEN — 7 p.m. today, 2 & 7 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday

WHERE — Arts Live Theatre in Fayetteville, 818 N. Sang. Ave.

COST — $6-$8

INFO — 521-4932 or artslivetheatre.com

"When we are rehearsing, and I want a scene to pick up the pace, I'll clap a rhythm. (The actors) pick up on it," he says.

He's directing "The Boxcar Children," the current production at Arts Live Theater is Fayetteville.

"The mantra and philosophy (of directing) are based on tempo, rhythm, mood, timbre -- the same words you'd use in music," Pigman says.

Pigman has a degree in theater, but music is his first love, he says. Directing allows him to combine the two.

"I really enjoy doing all the research and the study to create the mood of the play. A lot of that has to do with music," he says.

For "The Boxcar Children," Pigman has enlisted the help of Fayetteville musicians and brothers Nikolai Margulis and Alexander Margulis to perform during the show's run to underscore the action and transition between the scenes. The pair will play banjo, a thunder sheet, a washboard and a pail to accompany the 1930s era story.

Cora Ferguson, a 14-year-old rising sophomore at Fayetteville High School, plays older sister Jessie in the show. In real life she's the younger sibling, so "it's a little bit different for me playing the older, more responsible one," she says.

To get into that mindset of an older sibling who is also a parental figure -- in the play, the older brother and sister take care of the younger brother and sister while living in an abandoned boxcar -- Ferguson says she recalls memories of playing in the woods near her house when she was younger.

"There's a creek near my house, and me and my friends would go there and act like we were on our own," she says.

"The Boxcar Children" is only her second show at Arts Live, but she performed in musicals each year as a student at Holt Middle School. And she also has been in band.

Pigman's musical directing style falls in line with Cora's musical background, and that's a beat she can easily follow.

-- Kelly Barnett

[email protected]

NAN What's Up on 06/24/2016

Upcoming Events