Jefferson College’s Christmas play, “Not Even a Mouse,” will have its world premiere Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 17-18, but the public will have the chance to meet the characters before that – during the sixth Leader Holiday Shopping Spree to be held this weekend.
The Holiday Shopping Spree, a one-stop holiday-shopping event, will be from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday (Nov. 10) at the Quality Inn, 1200 Gannon Drive, in Festus. Admission to the shopping spree is free.
More than 20 merchants and vendors will be at the shopping spree offering great Christmas gifts. Two of the vendors – Meert Tree Farm and the Wood Den, both of the Festus area – will sell Christmas decorations and other items. Other vendors include Prospectors Crystals, Rocks and Gift Shop of High Ridge, Flour de Lis Bakery of De Soto and Ochs Home Furnishings of De Soto. There also will be a local vendor that sells toys. For a complete list of vendors, see Page ?.
For those who work up an appetite while shopping, the Farmer’s Kitchen restaurant of De Soto will offer lunch from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. The restaurant will be set up in the hotel’s breakfast room and will sell pulled pork sandwiches and home-made chips, as well as chili and soups. Soda and water will be sold, too.
In addition, members of the Jefferson County and Southern Model Railroad Club will be on hand to show off their HO trains and landscapes.
People also will get to meet actors from the “Not Even a Mouse” cast, who will be dressed in costume.
Jefferson College associate professor of English Chris Otto said he wrote the play after his colleague, Rebecca Ellison, a communications and theatre professor, asked him to.
“Rebecca said, ‘I can’t find a good children’s play – why don’t you write one?’ I thought it would be kind of fun and agreed to do it,” said Otto, who had helped Ellison with a previous production. “She had a few stipulations. It has to have a message. It has to have a moral lesson, audience participation and it also has to have Santa Claus.”
Otto’s play will be performed at 2 p.m. on Nov. 17 and Nov. 18 at the college’s Fine Arts Theatre on the Hillsboro campus. Tickets cost $2.
The play’s title comes from the Clement C. Moore poem, “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” Otto said.
“I don’t know why, but my mind immediately went to cats chasing mice and the title of the play just jumped out,” he said. “The protagonist is a young mouse named Freddy (played by Matthew Bell). He is kind of bullied by a mean cat named Rebecca (played by Whitney Dodson). Through the course of the play these two work out their differences.”
Freddy the mouse and Rebecca the cat are also students and are and given an assignment to write a letter to Santa Claus.
“Rebecca threatens Freddy and tells him he has to write the winning letter for her to win a prize from the teacher,” Otto said. “Freddy decides to get back at Rebecca to write a letter that insults the teacher and gets Rebecca in trouble when they read the letters in class.”
It all works out in the end.
“Ultimately, they become friends,” Otto said. “I hope the play is funny and the kids have a good time watching it.”
Otto said it is not a coincidence that the mean cat has the same name as the play’s director.
“The cat is named after Rebecca Ellison,” he said. “It’s sort of an inside joke.”
Ellison said she takes it as compliment.
“As far as the cat being named after me, I’m honored that she is,” Ellis said. “She is a fun character who learns an important lesson in the play.”
Ellis said she believes the play will be a crowd-pleaser.
“This children’s production is interactive,” she said. “(The audience) interacts with the actors. It’s very entertaining and, I think, teaches a good lesson.”
The cast is entirely made up of Jefferson College students. Other cast members include Lucas Ellis, Tessa Vonderahe, Nama Chibitty, Tara Uribe, Skyler Hunt and Jade Null, all playing cats; and Emily Manning, Mary Beth Schueler, Madison Raney, Brandon Menke, Logan Brown and Tiffany Vonderahe, playing the mice, as well as Desiree Terry and Ian McCreary as elves and Sabrina Ortiz as Mrs. Crabapple.
Tickets may be purchased in advance by phone at 636-481-3367 or email at rellison@jeffco.edu. Tickets also may be purchased at the door, but seating is limited.
“I highly recommend reserving the tickets,” Ellison said.