University production of 'To Kill a Mockingbird' begins sold-out run

The theatrical production of the classic Harper Lee novel "To Kill a Mockingbird," which opened Tuesday at the Southeast Missouri State University River Campus, has been sold out for more than two weeks, with a waiting list of about 60 people hoping for cancellations.

"The show sold out almost instantly," said professor Kenneth L. Stilson of the university's Department of Theatre and Dance. Stilson is directing the play.

The university moved the show's opening from today to Tuesday and also added a Friday morning show and a Sunday night performance to accommodate the demand for tickets. Those quickly sold out as well, Stilson said.

Box office director Ellen Farrow estimated that 20 to 25 percent of ticket sales have been for university students and that almost 200 tickets have been sold to high school students. Stilson said he believes the brisk sales are largely due to the fact that so many people have read the novel in school or have seen the Academy Award-winning picture starring Gregory Peck.

"It's just that popular of a story," Stilson said. "It's that powerful of a story that I think everybody knows it."

The fact that the audience is so familiar with the story does have its downside, Stilson said.

"When you take a book like this, if you told it in its entirety, it would be an eight-hour play, so you have to take this eight-hour story and condense it into a two-hour story," Stilson said. "Our job is to try to fill in the parts of the novel that were selectively taken out of the novel, and we try to fill it in with visual storytelling and with music. It puts a lot of pressure on production to fill in those blanks as best you can."

"To Kill a Mockingbird" is the story of a country lawyer who wages a battle against ignorance and racism in 1936 Alabama, as seen through the eyes of his 6-year-old daughter, Scout.

The play begins at 7:30 p.m. nightly through Sunday at the Rust Flexible Theatre, with matinee performances at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

Farrow said those without tickets can come to the theater and wait for seats that might become available from no-shows.