For a town of 96 people, it was all hands on deck for the Jansen Community Players dinner theatre fundraiser on April 5-7.
The community players have been on the Jansen stage since 2000 with the 2018 performance being their seventh fundraising endeavor.
This is their first performance in seven years, says Director Val Koshinsky, and that was too long of a break, she says.
“We had a lot of very busy things going on a very small community for about 5 years and we thought we’ve got to get back to this before it’s totally lost.”
Even given the small population of Jansen, it was not hard to get people behind it, says producer Kathy Jones, with everyone jumping in with both feet.
“We have an awesome community and surrounding area.”
While previous dinner theatre productions had around 11 local actors coming onto the stage, this time around the production was a little smaller, says Koshinsky, with a seven actor play.
This time around the community players also went a different route compared to previous years by putting on a comedy performance instead of their usual murder mystery.
The play focused on Jane and Sybil, two lingerie designers who are trying to close a big deal with an international lingerie distributor to the tune of $5 million.
Wanting to surprise their spouses after the deal is done, Jane and Sybil do not tell their husbands, Paul and George, of their activities. This only make matters worse as the two men think they are going to find their wives cheating after they track them down to a luxurious hotel room.
Of course hilarity ensues as Paul and George take matters into their own hands and get arrested in the process and disguise themselves as women.
It was no problem getting Paul and George, played by Ken Manyk and Albert Cardinal, into women considering the two men like to ham it up, says Jones.
“We had very willing actors,” says Koshinsky, even with calving and kids sports on the agenda for most people.
“They were very dedicated. They did sacrifice a lot.”
With females taking the lead in the play, Heidi Craig and Melissa Klinger, who played Jane and Sybil, took the leap to larger parts this year.
The hours put into memorizing lines and being up on stage paid off with a full house, says Craig.
Manyk, a.k.a Paul, has been in six of the last seven productions and dressing in drag is nothing new.
“The first time out in front of the crowd is meh but you get used to it. It doesn’t bother me a whole bunch,” he says.
With the production being a fundraiser for a small community, it takes the whole community to put it on and hours upon hours of work going into it, says Manyk. There is a lot of people putting it on besides the actors on the stage, he says.
“In the end, it’s worth it.”
Money raised from the Dinner Theatre will stay in Jansen and area, however Jones says they are unsure how it will be spent.
Previous years saw money to towards the bowling alley, both Lanigan schools, the RM of Prairie Rose history books, the Jansen Canada Day celebration, and the Jansen outdoor facility just to name a few.
They are hoping to put money into lighting and a sound system for the community hall, but no decision has been made yet.
