A few weeks ago, my mother called us to ask me something. My (now 12-year-old) niece, whose mother is the older of my two sisters (both younger than I), had been in a production of
Oklahoma! at her Catholic school in Gulfport MS, where my BIL had been stationed as a Seabee. My mother
swears that she told me, "Hannah has a major role in it," but for some unknown reason, I didn't catch the word "major." I said, "Sure. We'll watch it." It's one of my wife's favorite musicals.
So, she gave it to us. One thing stood out right away--the disc is copyrighted. Hmmm. But, I suppose that anyone (even CalSwine) can go on LegalZoom and copyright even the tripe that she puts on paper. Other things interfered. My mother called us last weekend and said, "Are you done with the DVD yet?" Nope. Oh well--we can watch it Monday night. So, last Monday night at around 8:15, I put it in. I told my wife, "Supposedly, Hannah has a part in this. Let's look for her." The first screen comes up. We pick the "Wednesday cast" option. It fades to the opening sequence. Ten seconds go by, and a figure shows up at the backdrop. The camera is zoomed out, but she looks vaguely familiar . . . and then it zooms in. As Hannah's face goes dead center in the screen, my jaw drops open. It's kinda obvious to me that I
missed something here. If you know the story, she plays Aunt Eller. Which, BTW, is a
perfect role for my niece. Then, twenty seconds later, as the boy playing Curly starts to sing, Hannah's 7 (still, I think!) year-old sister shows up in a "cowboy chorus" to the right of the stage. All the other kids are looking straight ahead--Katie is watching the kid playing Curly. I'm thinking, "No, kid! Don't look at him!"
Anyway, Hannah did awesomely. The girl can sing, she cah dance, and she can act--plus sustain a twang throughout the over two hours of the production. I called my mother Tuesday and told her, "It's obvious that her singing came from our side of the family." My parents did hear me sing (with the music teacher) last year, so they know I've got some ability.
Just wanted to brag about my niece(s), that's all . . .
