Standing Room Only (SRO) Theater recently concluded multiple successful showings of “Miracle on 34th Street” at its location at the Outpost Church in Yelm and saw a 20% increase in attendance versus this time last year.
SRO Theater President Steve Harshfield said that more than 200 community members attended the community-based organization’s six showings of the holiday classic. The theater group’s performance was based on the 1947 American Christmas comedy drama written by George Seaton.
“We definitely greatly appreciate the support from the community,” Harshfield said. “We couldn’t and wouldn’t do this without the community support. It’s always nice, and we had about a 20% increase in our attendance this year versus last year’s attendance around Christmas time. It’s been a great experience, and we want to continue bringing live theater and creative programs to Yelm and surrounding areas.”
Harshfield said it means a lot to SRO Theater participants to see consistent year-to-year increases in attendance.
“It’s nice to see the community coming out to support us,” he said. “I’d say every show, we have somebody say that they didn’t know we were still doing shows or that they thought the theater was closed. It’s been a downside because the Triad closed, and it was always a crapshoot if someone even knew what the Triad was — even though it was in the center of town. It will be nice to have a real, bonafide theater here soon. We’re still working on that.”
Harshfield added that SRO Theater also participated in the Christmas in the Park parade for the first time in early December. He said the theater group had a lot of fun but described it as a wet experience.
“We had a float, and we were working with the Chamber of Commerce on the fact that we had a Santa and they had a Santa. They put us at the beginning of the parade, and they had their Santa at the end of the parade. You can’t do ‘Miracle of 34th Street’ without Santa. He was a big part of ours. We had a lot of fun putting our float together, and we almost literally floated away in our float,” Harshfield said. “We also did a preview at the park for ‘Miracle on 34th Street,’ which a lot of our cast members participated in. We had a lot of fun doing that, too.”
Harshfield said that the organization is still working on its schedule for 2025 but will likely not feature a Valentine’s-themed program next year.
“We were hoping to get a Valentine’s program together, but with the holiday season, I’m not sure if we’ll be able to do that. We’d have to do auditions and rehearsals through the holidays, and it becomes a difficult thing to get scheduled,” Harshfield said. “We’re still working on our schedule for 2025, but we know we’ll have our murder mystery program, and we know we’ll have our haunted house. Farrelli’s has asked us to expand our murder mystery there, and we’ll probably be doing that in June. We’re also trying to figure out what we’re doing for Christmas, as well. We’re probably going to do ‘A Christmas Carol’ for Christmas next year.”
SRO’s next annual meeting will take place at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 8. For more information, email standrmonly@gmail.com.
