Bigfork Community Players
History
By KRISTI ALBERTSON/This Week in the Flathead, February 13, 2013
One of the Flathead Valley’s original community theater groups is celebrating a milestone this year.
The Bigfork Community Players have been ensuring the valley has year-round theater options since 1984. At that time, Bigfork Summer Playhouse offered performances during the summer months, but there weren’t many local theater options the rest of the year, said Barbara Langlois, a longtime member of the group.
The players were formed when Bigfork resident Joan Bedford put out a casting call for a melodrama, Langlois recalled. (correction: the Players was the brain-child of Don Thomson, Bigfork Summer Playhouse. Bedford was one of the first directors of the fledgling group.)
Langlois, who had moved to the valley from Bozeman, had always wanted to try her hand at acting but had been too busy raising her children to get involved with theater. When she heard about Bedford’s goal of putting on “Bad Day at Dry Creek,” she decided to try out - and ended up cast as a bar maid.
That began Langlois’ three decades of involvement with the players. During the group’s 25th anniversary celebration, when the players again performed “Bad Day at Dry Creek,” Langlois reprised her bar maid role.
She wasn’t the only bar maid in the original play. In its early years, all of Bigfork Community Players’ productions were double cast.
“It was a nightmare for the director, but it certainly did involve more people,” Langlois said.
And double casting came in handy for the amateur group. Nearly all the actors had day jobs, so there was always the chance someone might have to miss a show. Langlois could recall one instance when an actor called in sick with laryngitis. Another time, an actor had to miss a show after getting into a car accident.
By KRISTI ALBERTSON/This Week in the Flathead, February 13, 2013
One of the Flathead Valley’s original community theater groups is celebrating a milestone this year.
The Bigfork Community Players have been ensuring the valley has year-round theater options since 1984. At that time, Bigfork Summer Playhouse offered performances during the summer months, but there weren’t many local theater options the rest of the year, said Barbara Langlois, a longtime member of the group.
The players were formed when Bigfork resident Joan Bedford put out a casting call for a melodrama, Langlois recalled. (correction: the Players was the brain-child of Don Thomson, Bigfork Summer Playhouse. Bedford was one of the first directors of the fledgling group.)
Langlois, who had moved to the valley from Bozeman, had always wanted to try her hand at acting but had been too busy raising her children to get involved with theater. When she heard about Bedford’s goal of putting on “Bad Day at Dry Creek,” she decided to try out - and ended up cast as a bar maid.
That began Langlois’ three decades of involvement with the players. During the group’s 25th anniversary celebration, when the players again performed “Bad Day at Dry Creek,” Langlois reprised her bar maid role.
She wasn’t the only bar maid in the original play. In its early years, all of Bigfork Community Players’ productions were double cast.
“It was a nightmare for the director, but it certainly did involve more people,” Langlois said.
And double casting came in handy for the amateur group. Nearly all the actors had day jobs, so there was always the chance someone might have to miss a show. Langlois could recall one instance when an actor called in sick with laryngitis. Another time, an actor had to miss a show after getting into a car accident.
