Morningstar is Whanganui Amdram Theatre’s latest production

Director of Morningstar Graham Dack, flaunting his weaponry.

Morningstar is Whanganui Amdram Theatre’s latest production, written by New Zealand playwright Albert Belz and directed by Graham Dack, who is also the theatre’s president.

Into its seventh week of rehearsal, it is the second Belz play performed at Amdram, the previous one being Yours Truly - a story of Jack the Ripper in London. All the actors are from Whanganui with some coming straight from Amdram’s recent production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera.

“Morningstar is a re-imagination of the archangels a year after Eden has been created,” Dack said.

The family has come back together to rejoin after “one trip around the sun”. Like any family, they’ve got some issues, ambitions of their own, and rivalries soon develop.

“With archangels, heaven, and Eden, everyone’s got their own idea of what that is and how it looks. It’s made it a challenge to stage so we’ve kept it simple with no set changes, the actors have to be on their toes as they quickly move from scene to scene. We are aiming to keep the audience engaged and in action throughout the performance.

“The force that drives the play is Lucifer, who has been looking for his father, he’s the firstborn, the favourite son. He’s been given a job to do by God which he doesn’t want to do.”

In the end, that will create heaven and hell as we know it now.

“He loves his father that much he carries out the plan. All the others are, by and large, unaware of what’s going on.

“He has to play them through the story. Did it happen like that? We all know Lucifer was a fallen angel - the way Belz has cast him in the play is a different take.

Amdram is New Zealand's oldest musical theatre.

“I’ve just come off from directing Phantom of the Opera which was on stage in the Royal Whanganui Opera House in March this year. The project started in 2019 aiming to be on stage in 2021 production, but it was postponed twice because of Covid. It was a large project with a cast of 53 and over 230 costumes for which I thank my wife for looking after.

“Morningstar has six actors, a smaller cast but the play still demands a high level of investigation and preparation. It’s very reliant upon the script and the actors to tell the story. It’s cleverly written, Belz is an interesting writer,” he said.

Amdram is the oldest musical theatre in New Zealand. Dack has been a member for 10 years and is the president. With his daughter being a trained actress, discussing theatre techniques is always a topic.

“I started doing small parts on stage, then did my first directing role in 2015, a play for the Gallipoli 100th anniversary,” Dack said. “Doing that, and seeing the audience’s reaction, got me hooked on directing.

“I love to be able to get a story across to people, getting a reaction. Theatre is here to shape life, to laugh, cry, think, and challenge belief, or it can make you feel disgusted if it wants to. People react in different ways,” he said.

■ Morningstar’s first performance is on August 10. There will be eight shows.