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Risqué scenes feature locals
by Gary Pinnell
Theater Shenandoah's guys and dolls bare it all for charity calendar.
They weren't really naked, says Barbara Strong.
"Although in some cases we were fairly close," says Barbara Plitt, Theater Shenandoah's production manager and treasurer.
Plitt, Stong and a dozen other members of Theater Shenandoah took it all off or most of it for a calendar. They appear in poses that make it seem they're nude.
"It was Eloise Haun's idea," says Strong, the theater's director.
In recognition, a grinning, feather-clad Dr. Haun, who has starred in several Theater Shenandoah productions appears on January's cover page as Madame Arcati in "Blythe Spirit." "She's a real stage ham," said Strong. Strong herself stands behind a piano, seemingly clad only in a red feather boa, as Miss February.
"We were talking about fundraisers," Strong said. The best idea they could come up with was a yard sale. "She said, 'I think we need to do a calendar.'" Another organization had tried it, and Theater Shenandoah members remembered the movie, "Calendar Girls," which strikes a similar theme.
"We thought it was perfect," Strong said.
The calendar is hot off the presses, so Strong hadn't heard any comments when she was interviewed last week.
And Strong did more than bare a little skin for the shoot.
"The day we shot, we were doing the Wicked Witch of the West October at my house. I was hanging up a parachute on my porch, and I tore up my knee." It took surgery to repair the knee.
They printed 350 calendars, and hope to sell them at $15 each that's $5,250 to help rebuild the stage and balcony at the opera house, Plitt says.
That's Theater Shenandoah's new home, given to them by the Town of Edinburg.
Only half of the original stage remains, and none of the balcony. More bathrooms are needed, and the building must be made accessible to the handicapped.
Theater Shenandoah's first production in the opera house will be "Peter Pan," currently scheduled for June 9-12. "Honey House" will be produced Feb. 11-13 at the Edinburg Mill, Plitt said.
The calendar photographers were Kay Ely-Pierce, Sansara Nirvana Murphy, Chris Gatesman and Barbara Strong. The scenes were staged at the Opera House, at the old Edinburg School, and the homes of Strong, Danny Sheetz and Ginny White.
Models for the calendar include Jeanne Russell, Suzanne Mills, Jane Miller, Haun, Plitt and Ginny Waite shielded by parasols in a scene from "My Fair Lady"; Charlie Aschman and Carter Weicking sans clothes in a Fort Valley outdoors scene from "Oliver"; Danny Sheetz, David Strong and Charlie Aschmann as sailors hanging out the window in a scene from "South Pacific"; Alan Weicking hidden only by a bass drum in a "Music Man" scene; Russell, Plitt and Mills (Mills is covered only by a board and a tool belt in perhaps the most risqué shot in the calendar); David Stone in the classic pose squatting behind a bass fiddle in "Fiddler on the Roof"; Waite and Miller in "The Wizard of Oz"; Sheetz and John McCracken in "The Fantastics." For the December page, Miller, Waite, Strong, Haun, Aschmann and Sheetz are in Santa hats, Chris Gateman's convertible and very little else.
More info: Theater Shenandoah, 107 Center St., Edinburg, Va. 22824, (540) 984-8076, or www.theatershenandoah.com.
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More stories on Shenandoah.com:
 (MASSANUTTEN REGIONAL LIBRARY)
- Yesterday
(Bluemont Concert Series)
- Wednesday Jul 28 2010
(Woodstock Enhancement Committee)
- Wednesday Jul 28 2010
(Virginia Farm Bureau)
- Wednesday Jul 28 2010
(The Warren Sentinel)
- Monday Nov 30 2009
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