Flowers for Algernon

 

a play by David Rogers

based upon the novel by Daniel Keyes

 

Cast of Characters (in order of appearance)

Dr. Strauss…..……………Nathan McCormick

Professor Nemur...………..Nathan Anderson

Alice Kinnian…...……..…Ashley Berkenpas

Burt Seldon…………………………Ben Silker

Charlie Gordon…………..…….……Nick Fiala

Doris.…………………...……..Hannah DeVries

Nurse………………...….……Allison Livingston

Frank………..........…………Micah Clipperton

Gina………………..………Marta Vander Top

Mrs. Donner……………….…Kelsey LeVahn

Joe……………….....………Elijah Clipperton

Mother….....………..…………Katlyn Lessner

Little Charlie...………………Jaedan Schaap

Father…………….……...…Ben Stephens

Child Norma…..………Elizabeth Johnson

Mrs. Feldman…….….......Rachel Hansen

Ellen……….……………Marissa Barry

Teen-age Charlie……….…Wesley Porter

Bernice……………Mattie Koppendrayer

Connie.....…….………Hannah DeVries

Chairle...……………Allison Livingston

Mrs. Mooney……………….Molly Barry

Mrs. Nemur……..Mattie Koppendrayer

Mr. Harvey.…..Nathaniel Koppendrayer

Jackie Welberg……..Hannah DeVries

Anne Welberg……..Allison Livingston

Norma…………..…………Abby Nyberg

Party guests, concert-goers..Marissa Barry

............................................Elizabeth Johnson

.................................Nathaniel Koppendrayer ...........................................AllisonLivingston 

............................................ Adam Whitcomb

 

 

 

 

 

 

A play in two acts with area staging as indicated below:

 

Act I

Strauss’ office, the lab, a hospital,

Charlie’s room, Mrs. Donner’s bakery,

Charlie’s childhood home,

Central Park, Charlie’s old school,

the convention

 

Intermission

(A freewill offering will be taken to off-set the cost of the play.)

 

Act II

Charlie’s new apartment,

Father’s barber shop, Charlie’s childhood home,

Strauss’ office, Nemur’s dinner party,

the lab, the lawn outside Charlie’s apartment

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Director’s Notes

Recently, a Minnesota politician called education the hope for the world. The fact that we often look to human intelligence as the solution to what is wrong in our world is hardly debatable—and historical events such as WW I and the Vietnam War or the number of people who die daily from hunger have not acted as deterrents. 

Like all quality art, this play asks more questions than provides answers.  What role should intelligence play in our lives? Does the value of human beings increase as our intelligence increases? What is learning for? Although the play does not provide easy answers to these questions, it does provide some guidance.

If we allow our intellectual ability and potential to define us as human beings, we miss a key part of what it means to be made in God’s image. Daniel Keyes, who wrote the novel on which the play is based, says it like this: “"Intelligence is one of the greatest human gifts. But all too often a search for knowledge drives out the search for love...”

With our intelligence we fight cancer more effectively and with it we have created increasingly powerful weapons that have killed millions. Unless we can understand the role of intelligence as it is connected with who we are as servants in a fallen world, we may find ourselves at the end of our lives—as did the poet Mary Oliver—wondering “what love might have done had we loved in time.”

Wendell Schaap

 

Co-director: Anneke Branderhorst

Stage managers: Rachel Mulder and Maycie Schutt

Sound and light crew: Vito Sauro, Lauren Schwabe and Eleanor Staricka

Pre-show music (design and composition): Wesley Porter

Stage crew: Kerri Mulder, Dani Nelson, Hanna Marra, Micah Nedrud, Will Hendrickson, Ashley Vo, Max Severin, Nathan Bonnema

Costume design: Marissa Barry and Allison Livingston

Poster and program cover art:  Allison Livingston

Make-up:  Hanna Marra, Lauren Schwabe, Molly Barry, Rachel Hansen, Jordan Severin, Marissa Barry

Cast pictures: Hannah DeVries

 

Special thanks to…

 

Steve LeVahn— production photography

Freeplaymusic for music performance rights

Kris Livingston—costume design and construction

Joan Lessner—set design and construction

Amy Teunissen, and Terri De Vries—dinner organization

The many parents of CCHS and staff members of Grace EFC for their assistance with set construction, lights, and sound

Produced by special arrangement with

THE DRAMATIC PUBLISHING COMPANY of Woodstock, Illinois.