Staff writer
With only a month of rehearsals remaining, the student actors, from Marion, Hillsboro, and Centre high schools witnessed the tangible beginnings of their play, “The Passion and the Story of Father Kapaun” on Sunday.
What was just words and ideas is now manifested in cotton and plywood.
Actors tried on costumes for the first time at the beginning of the two-hour evening practice. Wiley Lundy, who plays John the apostle and Pontius Pilot, donned varieties of flowing robes. Elizabeth Goentzel tried on pink variations of the same costume idea.
Soldiers Eric Regnier, Justin Houser, and Nicholas Davies squeezed into Korean War-era-accurate American soldier uniforms, acquired from an Army Surplus Store in Wichita.
“Soldiers were a lot smaller back then,” confirmation coordinator and play director Rose Davidson told her actors.
In a re-creation of famous photographs, Ethan Oborny, playing Emil Kapaun, mimed mass in front of a green Army jeep constructed out of plywood. Davidson told Ethan to try out the scene, even though he will receive more instruction from Father Hien Hguyen on the parts of the mass.
Ethan has been excited about the idea of the play since before parts were decided. Davidson told the 37 confirmation students about the play at their first Confirmation class this fall; the play will take the place of a community project.
“It’s a more exciting, hands-on way to learn about the faith,” Ethan said. “I learn better with physical things than reading out of a book. It’s definitely a different way of doing it.”
Since they began working on the play, no confirmation student has missed a class, Davidson said.
Acting the Stations of the Cross is not new for Holy Family parish; Davidson said that such performances have previously taken place in the church. However, adding the Kapaun story was a different prospect.
Davidson was inspired to create the Kapaun play after fielding weekly calls from people interested in learning about the candidate for canonization. People from as far away as Australia have stopped in Pilsen to view Kapaun’s home church, St. John Nepomuceme.
With the interest in place from Marion County residents and foreigners alike, she contacted Harriet Bina to begin the writing process. Bina writes poems and other creative works, including a poem for Davidson’s wedding.
“She has a real knack for it,” Davidson said.
Bina compiled information about Kapaun and then sat down with Davidson and Nguyen to edit Bina’s writings to make them more readable for narrators.
The plan for the play is to have students narrate a section of the two stories one at a time. The stage at the USD 408 Performing Arts Center will be divided in half with a spotlight switching between the two mimed stories.
“It will kind of be a pingpong thing,” Davidson said.
The Passion is divided into 14 Stations of the Cross; dividing Kapaun’s life into 14 sections required some creativity from Davidson. His birth, first communion, ordination, and first mass make up a few of the first scenes before his heroics in Korea began. The miracle with Colwich pole-vaulter Chase Kear, who recovered from a seemingly fatal head injury resulting from a vaulting accident, will be the final scene for the play pertaining to Kapaun.
Also included in the performance will be traditional songs for the Passion, sung by cantors between scenes.
“It will be very spiritual and very entertaining,” Davidson said.
Some of the main parts in the play are Jesus, played by Kyle Palic of Marion; Mary, played by Morganne Hamm of Hillsboro; Veronica — the woman who wipes Jesus’ face, creating the Shroud of Turin — played by Briana Hall of Marion; Elizabeth Kapaun, played by Courtney Weber of Hillsboro, and Enos Kapaun, played by Chad Mueller of Centre.
The free performance — about 90 minutes long — will be 7 p.m. April 20, during Holy Week.