Kacy Chamberlain and Tamara Salisbury were approached about heading up a community theatre performance by the Conway Springs Development Foundation in May 2019 (since they were in charge of the high school plays twice a year). A few weeks later, we hit the ground running: scripts and royalties were purchased by the Foundation, and soon we were holding auditions and preparing the stage for our first performance.
We had no idea how many people to expect during those first hours of auditions, but we were blown away by the talent right here in Conway Springs. During those few months of rehearsals, several others gave of their skills in preparing the stage, including moving some electrical and tearing down the old half wall that surrounded most of the performance area.
The community showed an incredible amount of support for the first performance, encouraging us to keep the momentum by planning a second show for December 2019. Then, though Covid-19 led to us cancelling the summer 2020 show, we jumped right back in with a small show in December 2020.
In 2021, we decided to take another leap: we made the December 2021 show a dinner theatre. We learned a lot but received great feedback, and we'll be moving the winter show to February in 2023 and hope to make that an annual dinner theatre.
In summer 2022, we had two very generous community members approach us about supporting us - and so they funded the purchase of our own lights. These two wanted to remain anonymous, but we are SO grateful!
We are excited to build a solid base for what will hopefully become a tradition for years to come!