The Hills are Alive in the Hill City: ‘The Sound of Music’ takes LU theatre stage

Over 40 years since its last production at Liberty University — and more than 60 years since its 1959 original Broadway production and 1965 movie — “The Sound of Music” will fill the air and hearts of Tower Theater audiences this month.

Opening Friday, April 11, and running through April 27, the Department of Theatre Arts will present the popular musical based on the true story of an Austrian woman named Maria Rainer who becomes a governess while she ponders being a nun. Maria arrives at the home of Captain von Trapp and his seven children and through her effervescent personality, love of music, and growing rapport with the children, she falls in love with the entire family, including the captain. Meanwhile, the Nazi party begins to grow in Austria, and the von Trapps must decide where their hearts and family belong.

Director and theatre professor Chris Nelson said “The Sound of Music” tells a story of hope, redemption, and love that has made it one of the most well-known and beloved shows in musical theater.

“There is nostalgia for this show among a lot of people,” he said. “The music resonates, it’s easily remembered with its nice melodies, but there is also a great love story and great conflict in the center of it. There’s a story of adoption too as we watch Maria find who she is and where she belongs.”

He said the captain’s decision to stay true to his values and morals is an element audiences can glean from.

“‘The Sound of Music’ continues to resonate with audiences over the years; no matter when they see it, they feel like the world is always up against the possibilities of evil growing around them,” he said. “The show does not shy away from the true nature of man. The show can just sit in a nostalgic place, but people can also leave with a little greater appreciation or just a little new perspective when they see it again and again.”

While Liberty students will play most of the roles in the show, the five youngest von Trapp children will be played by local child actors, many of whom have attended the department’s Theatre Uncut and LUTC summer camps.

Lily Smith, a junior in the Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theatre program, will play the postulant-turned-governess Maria. While the musical takes liberties with the true story of Maria Augusta von Trapp, Smith said it still stirs real emotions and points to our need to find true hope.

“If this was a fictional story, I don’t know if it would be as popular as it is. It’s a beautiful story — she’s a wonderfully written, strong, passionate, beautiful female character — but the fact that she was a real person really piques the interest of people watching it. If this woman from an abbey who is skipping around the woods can change the heart of this rigid captain, then how much more can Christ change the hardest of hearts? This is a story of redemption and hope. People need hope, and people need redemption.”

“The story of Maria Rainer, with what she goes through and the amount of joy and hope and strength that she has through everything, people see that, and they’re inspired and encouraged,” she added.

After performing in supporting or backstage roles in previous Liberty productions, Smith said playing the lead is an opportunity to stretch herself as an artist. Playing the same role as a legendary actress like Julie Andrews, who played Maria in the film version, could cause pressure, but Smith recalled a lesson she learned from department chair and professor Linda Nell Cooper on the difference between being an artist and an artisan, that trying to recreate another’s performance would be a disservice to herself and to the character.

“If you’re an artisan, you mimic and you copy, but if you’re an artist, you create,” Smith said. “I’m relinquishing expectation from the fact that this is a classic Julie Andrews part, that I’m not Julie Andrews, but that I am who I am, and that is what’s important. Everyone is going to play the role a little bit differently, because everyone is different.

If I mimic her, I’m not an artist; I’m an artisan. God made nothing into everything, and what’s beautiful is that He gifted us with some of that creative skill, because we’re made in His image.”

Showtimes

Visit the Department of Theatre Arts website for ticket information.

• April 11, 12, 17, 18, 19, 24, 25, 26 – 7:30 p.m.
• April 12, 19, 26 – 2 p.m.
• April 13, 27 – 3 p.m.