Model Theatre
ZELIENOPLE — The region will soon be visited by a traveling theater group.
The Model Theatre Troupe from Baden will open a playhouse in June in the Royl Lane Stables on Harkins Mill Road.
“We’re going to transform it for several weeks,” said troupe founder, director and president Margie Dagenhard-Linville. “We’re just wanting to do something that would be fun for the whole family.”
Performances for the Royl Lane Playhouse are scheduled for 7:30 p.m. June 10 and 11. A matinee will be at 3 p.m. June 12.
The troupe also will perform at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, 215 N. Main St. in Zelienople, at 7:30 p.m. June 17 and 18 and at 3 p.m. June 19.
It will perform in Cook Forest the weekend before the Zelienople shows.
The show itself is called “Broadway Around the World Review,” created by James Critchfield. It will take different shows from different areas of the world and provide narrative information about them, including who wrote them, when they premiered and the inspiration behind them.
“It will be a great experience educationally,” Dagenhard-Linville said.
Critchfield, a theater veteran and Point Park University alumnus, said the show is not yet complete and songs have not been selected. However, those choices will have been made by the time he meets with the troupe and other actors.
“We’re looking for an opportunity to showcase some performers who have auditioned for the theater company,” Critchfield said. “We thought this might be the best way to do that.”
Themes for the show include love and friendship.
“We’re excited about getting started,” said Critchfield, who also worked with the troupe last year.
The group, which was formed in 2000, has the majority of its members from Butler, Beaver and Allegheny counties.
Dagenhard-Linville was one of the founders of the Comtra Theatre in Cranberry Township. She does not want the Model Theatre Troupe to be competition for the Comtra, but rather an alternative venue.
“This one (show) is going to be very special because it’s homegrown,” she said. “We’re using people who are here and people who have ideas about how to write the shows and make it successful.”
Although there are 30 to 60 members in the troupe at times, Dagenhard-Linville said there will be up to 12 people in the Zelienople shows.
“We’re trying to get more of a callback for other people to know about us rather than being at some theater that has its own clientele,” Dagenhard-Linville said.
She said the club donates some of its proceeds to the Yellow Ribbon Girls in Ellwood City and United Service Organizations.
For more information, contact Dagenhard-Linville at 724-910-3557.
