Mr. Tim Hanes has a wealth of experience in music, church music, education and musical theater. But the director of music at Resurrection, Longwood, credits the Rev. Joe Sitts, a former rector at the church, with the initial vision for a ministry that has become a long-standing outreach tradition: Resurrection Players.
When Hanes began at Resurrection in 2005 as an assistant who would ultimately replace the church’s music director, who planned to retire, Sitts told him, “I want all of the music ministries that we normally do for a church, but I really am interested in getting something started with the children and doing some type of musical. … I just want something with toe-tapping and fun.”
And Hanes rose to the challenge. “I started in September, and then that spring, we produced our first show, and it’s just grown since then,” he said of the musical theater ministry, which has produced 42 different shows through the ensuing years, many with multiple presentations.
Like nearly every ministry, Resurrection Players had a mandated pause during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although Hanes said the lockdown forced him and his team to stop producing shows, they kept in touch with the kids and “We did what everyone else in the world did: We learned the joys of Zoom.”
Because of many his contacts in the New York City theater industry, he set up a series of online workshops and calls for ministry participants with actors and talent agents. As the pandemic restrictions lifted, the church reopened, and the kids came back to the stage.
“I’m very happy to say under the leadership of Father Dave Johnson, we’re growing, and the church is coming back, and we’re extremely happy with that,” Hanes said. “In the fall, Resurrection Players presented the musical A Christmas Story and also Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Jr. with our younger kids.” This spring, Resurrection Players has 88 students from pre-K through grade 12 involved in three different productions.
Hanes emphasized the community element of the musical theater ministry. “Some of those kids come, and yes, they realize, ‘Hey, there’s a church here.’ …. I have choir members in my adult choir now who brought their child to be a performer and they liked to sing, they were looking for a church, and Resurrection is now their home,” he said. “That’s a happy result. But that’s not the focus and goal, because we have members from area churches who are there [in Resurrection Players], and the last thing I want to do is to try to poach them.”
Resurrection Players is a team effort in every way, he said. “We have a couple of choreographers who started with me as children and are now in their 20s. They choregraph and direct. We’ve got people who handle the costumes. We have an event coordinator, Ann Rusk, who gathers all the parents when they sign up for their child’s audition and asks if they would like to work on a committee. … I dare say we have anywhere from 20 to 30 parents assisting us with the current production.”
In preparation for each show, Resurrection Players schedules Parent Work Days on certain Saturdays. “All of the parents who want to help come in, and we work on sets; we work on costumes; we work on props; we just get as much done as we can,” Hanes said. “And we’ve just always been very blessed with support.”
Click image to view larger.
Click image to view larger.
Click image to view larger.
For the upcoming shows, 22 middle and high school students, grades seven and up, will perform The Wizard of Oz on April 29 at 7 p.m. and April 30 at 2 p.m. Forty-four students in grades two through six will present Disney Descendants: The Musical on May 5 at 7 p.m., May 6 at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m., and May 7 at 2 p.m. A final group of 22 children, ages 4-7, will perform Frozen Kids on May 6 at 7 p.m. and May 7 at 2 p.m.
The cost for each child who participates in a show is $75, which covers all the rehearsals, a T-shirt with the show logo and cast names, a wine-and-cheese reception for the parents and a cast party with cake and ice cream. Any extra money goes toward costumes. Spring and fall shows have a 12-week rehearsal schedule, and in the summer, Resurrection Players offers “Summer Stock,” a two-week, tuition-based program similar to musical theater camp.
“People can go to our church website and see what we’re doing,” Hanes said, explaining that Resurrection Players has never advertised to gain participants. “Our parents are our best advertisement,” he said. “They come back, they tell their friends and they bring them in; I think that’s why we have the size of program we do.”
Hanes thanks God for the growth of the ministry through the years. “There are young people in our community who call Resurrection home,” he said. “And I’m just very proud of and excited about that. And I think that’s ultimately what our church is there for.”
All photos | Photo Credit: Resurrection Players