A bluegrass musical in Castlemaine is drawing new faces to the community theatre world.
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Three's A Company premiered Bright Star last weekend with performances continuing for the next two weeks.
Director Matt Sheehan said the region's folk musicians combined with local theatrical talent meant people not typically involved in musicals were interested in taking part.
"(The show) is not well known at all but the writers, Steve Martin and Edie Brickell, are," Sheehan said.
"So we were trying to promote that knowing Steve Martin is popular and quite funny, which has been a bit of a draw card for people curious about the musical theatre space.
"We have done a lot of little snippets of our quite amazing band on Instagram to give people a taste of the show. It's not easy to promote something people don't know like Chicago or other big shows.
"But the response has been good. A couple times during the show I sneak out to watch. Even when quite serious things are going on there were people tapping their toes.
"It is bringing in people who don't typically go to musical theatre. Last week there was a banjo jamboree in Guildford, so a lot of people who like that musical came along."
Bright Star follows a woman at two points in her life - a carefree 16-year-old and a well-to-do magazine editor 22 years later.
Sheehan said a busy theatrical calendar made it difficult to fully cast the show early on.
"There was a lot interest from people who aren't typically involved in musical and a lot of interest people who are," he said.
"Because of big ticket shows like Wicked, people put their name down but the Wicked came up and they withdrew (to pursue that).
"So we had a few musical theatre people a lot of folk music people, which was refreshing and good but challenging. We ended with cast of several actors and musicians, quite a few who were new but they're great.
"Tapping into the singer-songwriter people (in central Victoria) who are performers has been refreshing."
Promoting the show through rehearsal sneak peeks and pop-up performances has seen Three's A Crowd ticket sales get a boost for this year's show.
"We did a fundraiser in August, which was a musical variety concert, and a flash mob at The Bridge Hotel last week as well as a few other little performances.
"A month out we had sold 300 tickets. We had about 200 at opening night and 150 at the Saturday and Sunday performances.
"There's still seats available but there's a real buzz around town so I'm hoping sales pickup again this week."
Three's A Crowd present Bright Star at the Phee Broadway Theatre on September 27 and 28 and October 4 and 5 at 8pm. It is also on September 29 at 2pm.
Tickets are $35. Visit www.3ac.com.au for more.
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