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vendredi 31 janvier 2014

Meet The Mad Hatters Of Sun City Texas

By Ernesto Berturand


The citizens of Sun City Texas tend to be chronic volunteers. The magnitude of volunteerism in the Georgetown local community which comes from the endeavors of Sun City Texas homeowners is immense.

One of the most interesting groups of volunteers is the Mad Hatters whose members are part of the Actors and Theater Arts Guild chartered club. This small group of performers read and act out traditional fairy tales for their audiences. The audiences are pre-kindergarten age children in Head Start programs, Georgetown ISD elementary schools, nursery schools and Alzheimer's patients. The performers are seen by approximately 5,000 children each year and many children remember the Mad Hatters from previous years and greet them with joy.

The Mad Hatters get their name from the costume that each performer wears during a performance. Each Mad Hatter wears plain black clothing and creates their own special hat that depicts the fairy tale and helps each child to focus their attention on the story. If the children see the Mad Hatters' story telling from pre-K to the second grade and hear one story each semester, they will have been exposed to all of the stories by the time they leave second grade.

Despite the fact that the Mad Hatters remain in their seats during the stories, they make the stories come alive by way of small props and enthusiastic gestures. They also try to reword a portion of the language within the stories to make the tales more modern and identifiable. Anytime a youngster knows the genuine fairy tale by heart, they take exceptional pleasure in paying attention to a somewhat unique adaptation that may seem like their very own father and mother communicating. And so after the Mama Bear of "goldilocks and the three bears" declares to Papa Bear when he complains that his porridge is just too cold, "Oh Papa Bear, I don't know how to make use of this spanking new micro-wave!" the kids scream with laughter.

The Mad Hatters have served the area for longer than ten years. The thespians practically all say that they gain more than they provide and have a passion for the work they do. As part of the Actors & Theater Arts Guild, the participants also take part in the annual variety show of music, dance and comedy routines as well as full-length comedy and drama theater productions at Sun City Texas.




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