Schools
Emmaus Girl Enjoyed Performing in "South Pacific"
Kylee Wigfield, 10, found the experience of acting in DeSales University production both tiring and exciting.
Kylee Wigfield got the acting bug when she performed in a talent show a few years ago at in Emmaus.
“I like singing and dancing,” Kylee says. “So I got the idea that I should start going in plays because you are singing and dancing sometimes.”
After the talent show, Kylee, now 10, performed in productions at her church, in Emmaus. She also had a role in “Seussical” at the Civic Theatre in Allentown.
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Her performance at the Civic Theatre prompted the director to pass along her name to the director of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, “South Pacific,” at DeSales University in Center Valley. The musical, which involves the U.S. Navy during World War II, was slated to run this summer from June 15 to July 3.
Kylee, who is African-American, played the role of Ngana, one of two half-Polynesian children of Emile de Becque, a French plantation owner. In the play, Nellie Forbush, a Navy nurse from Little Rock, Arkansas, falls in love with Emile.
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Emile also loves Nellie. However, at first Nellie has a difficult time accepting the fact that he has mixed-race children, Ngana and Jerome. Nellie eventually learns to accept and love Emile’s children.
It’s a poignant situation, given that Kylee’s mother in real life is Susan Wigfield, a white woman who adopted Kylee as an infant. “It was the best day of my life,” Susan Wigfield says, recalling the day she brought Kylee home.
“South Pacific” prompted discussions about racism in the Wigfield home, and between the cast and the audience during “talk back” sessions following some of the performances at DeSales University.
People have to learn to overcome racism, Kylee says. “You have to be carefully taught.”
Kylee says her role in “South Pacific” required a lot of hard work, including the learning of some French so that Ngana and Jerome could speak the language and sing “Dites-Moi” as they play together on stage.
Three weeks of rehearsals usually lasted from 6 or 7 p.m. until 10 or 11 p.m. and then there were 20 performances over a three-week period.
But it was well worth the effort, Kylee says. “It was tiring but very, very, very exciting and fun.”