Columnists |
|
Cover Story
from the March/April 2007 issue
BRAVO!
A parish in Erie explores
the art of community
Story and photos by Anne-Marie Welsh
If Mary Ann Muller ever wins the lottery, she knows exactly what she’s going to do with the money.
“The children who go to school at St. Boniface in Hammett Wattsburg will never have to worry about tuition again,” she says of her alma mater. “Next, I’m going to start a foundation to help cover the cost of medication for people whose insurance doesn’t cover what they need for their mental illness,” she continues. “And then I’m going to build a beautiful, top-notch, permanent theatre for Our Lady of Peace Parish.” She stops to consider her dreams: “I’m going to have to hit it big,” she admits with a laugh.
 |
A founding member of the OLP Playhouse, Muller has helped guide the organization—no, it’s a ministry, she insists—through its first 7 years of life. The playhouse has done it all: musicals, plays, dinner theaters, a reader’s theater, even. To date, the outreach has involved more than 500 people either on stage or behind-the-scenes. That, more than anything, pleases the playhouse board. Sure, the playhouse has used some of its earnings to support parish and school efforts, or to make donations to other ministries such as the Emmaus Soup Kitchen in Erie. “But its primary mission has always been community building,” says Father Tom Brooks, pastor of Our Lady of Peace in Erie. “The playhouse exists to encourage the expression of gifts and talents and to strengthen our community through this art form. That’s where we want to keep the focus.”
In the very beginning, Father Mike DeMartinis was a parochial vicar at the parish, his first priestly assignment. He enjoyed the company of a circle of friends at the parish, and one summer evening in 1999 the group hit upon the idea of producing a show as part of the parish celebration that was being planned to welcome the new millennium.
“We always operate on a shoestring, but that was really the case with the first production,” Muller remembers. “We created a variety show, writing our own script to tie together a series of royalty-free songs representative of each decade of the 20th century.” Initial costs were covered by OLP’s youth group, which then used the proceeds to fund its week-long mission trip to New York City to work among the poor.
 |
About 50 people, mostly parishioners but some from other parishes and faiths, came forward to be part of the show. Something special began happening from the start. “We had a young woman with mental disabilities join the cast,” Muller says. “And to this day, I think that experience has done more for me than any of the other experiences I’ve had with the playhouse over the years. The high school kids took to Allyson automatically. She was 17 at the time and it was amazing to see how those teenagers took her under their wing. We didn’t have to say a word.” Allyson passed away in her early twenties, but she remains an inspiration to all the cast members who came to know and love her.
It actually took a few years for those involved with the playhouse to realize its potential. They experimented with a variety of genres. Some shows such as Oliver! and Music Man were selected specifically to involve a range of ages so families could enjoy performing together. Others, such as the Wizard of Oz and Babes in Toyland were chosen to give as many children as possible the chance to be on stage. Plays such as The Odd Couple, Barefoot in the Park and Arsenic and Old Lace gave those who weren’t necessarily gifted with musical abilities the chance to shine. And last year, the playhouse even took a reader’s theater production of The Jeweler’s Shop, written by Pope John Paul II before he was elected to the papacy, on the road.
|
Muller thinks part of the success of the playhouse is that it gives people a place to use their talents. “I think of Jim Moore,” she says, referring to a retiree whose wife volunteered his services as a clarinetist. “What my wife didn’t tell anyone was that I hadn’t touched the instrument in 30 years,” Moore told a crowd when the playhouse held its first Uncle Tony Awards, a celebration designed to salute some of the best performances and behind-the-scenes work in the then-five-year history of the playhouse. (The awards, a spoof on Broadway’s Tony Awards, were named in part for Tony DeMartinis, Father Mike’s uncle and a beloved playhouse regular.) Moore has been a staple in the orchestra pit at the OLP Playhouse and is now in demand at other venues including the Erie Playhouse. “He didn’t have a place to use that God-given talent until we created the playhouse,” Muller observes. “Now he’s playing constantly and loving it.”
As the playhouse geared up to put on Seussical the Musical in early March, Gloria Knouse was among the show’s 93 cast members. (Everyone who auditions for shows at OLP is guaranteed a part, although the board is reluctantly beginning to consider some sort of limits as interest grows.) Gloria, a founding member of the parish that just celebrated its 50th anniversary last year, ran into several health problems in 2003 and 2004. She had a double mastectomy after developing breast cancer, followed by surgery to place four stents in her heart. She then broke her ankle, twice. Not surprisingly, she developed diabetes as a result of the stress. “Instead of babying myself, I made up my mind to do everything I wanted to do and to take it one day at a time,” Gloria says. “I always wanted to be in a play, so when they announced they were going to do Music Man at OLP, I held my breath and asked if they auditioned 81-year-olds. They said, ‘Sure, we’re glad to see you!’” she says with a chuckle. “I couldn’t get over that.” She took the stage and loved every minute of it.
|
“Everybody was so nice to me,” she marvels. “Even the little kids. They would say, ‘Are you alright Mrs. Knouse?’ They were wonderful, I just loved them.” She found the performances as thrilling as she had hoped. “When we got the standing ovations, everybody stood up and whistled and clapped and hollered—boy, that made me proud,” she says. Also feeling a little of that pride were her three sons and six grandchildren in the audience. During green room—the time-honored tradition of cast and crew gathering together for prayer and sharing prior to each performance—Gloria told those gathered that she had changed her mind about not pursuing further treatment for her cancer, which had recurred. She now realized she had much more to accomplish in her life. “In a months’ time that tumor was completely gone,” she says. “I’m in remission and I’m so happy it isn’t even funny.”
“People used to question the role of a playhouse in a parish,” Muller says, “but that happens less and less. They recognize that not everyone is called to use their gifts right in church during Mass. And they’ve seen playhouse members grow in their faith as well as in their commitment to other aspects of the parish,” she observes. “I’m not sure what more you could ask for.”
Please tell us what you thought of this feature
Other parishes interested in exploring the possibilities of a similar endeavor are invited to contact Mary Ann Muller through Our Lady of Peace Parish at 814.833.7701. Copies of the prayers written by playhouse members and shared at the opening and closing of each rehearsal and performance are available at www.erieRCD.org.