IN THE CLASSROOM:Actors love ‘Annie’

The Junior Park Avenue Players don’t mess around.

Attendees at Thurston Middle School’s production of “Annie” will be highly impressed by the first-rate venue and the fancy programs, but the studiousness of the kids onstage will be the show’s biggest talking point.

“It’s really hard work, but it’s also really fun,” said Nusheen Goshtasbi, who plays an orphan.

The show opens tonight, with productions at 4 and 7 p.m.; it also runs Saturday and Sunday, as well as the following weekend, at the same times.

Tickets will go on sale one hour before each show and are $5 for students and $10 for adults.

The students are well aware of how blessed they are to have such a top-notch venue and supportive parents.

“We’re so fortunate to live in this community, where it’s all about the arts,” Crystal Pittman said.

“You forget how devoted it is here until you go somewhere else,” Devin Altieri said, adding that her friends in Aliso Viejo are extremely envious of their program.

“I get so much support here it’s ridiculous,” teacher and director Mark Dressler said, as he opened a carton of glossy, professional programs.

At a Wednesday dress rehearsal, kids in costume intently watched a live feed of the show in the green room, commenting on dance steps and cues.

Dressler furiously scribbled away at a notepad in the audience, noting minute errors in lighting and blocking that most community theaters would let slide.

But his students are perfectionists, voluntarily choosing to stay after rehearsals to hear all of his notes.

A little bit of sugar helped the medicine go down.

“There’s no question in my mind that you guys are really going to have a great show,” Dressler told the group, before adding (to rousing cheers) that it may be one of the best productions he’s yet seen at Thurston.

There are so many students at the school who want to be in Dressler’s drama program that there are two casts of “Annie,” delineated by Period One and Period Three classes.

“Practically a tenth of the students here at Thurston are in drama,” Dressler said; with more than 60 students performing in “Annie,” that’s not hard to believe.

The students performed previews at the district’s elementary schools and at Thurston’s Black Box Theatre earlier this week.

Future drama students, watching their older siblings perform, were entranced by the story.

One boy’s mouth dropped wide open during a crucial part of the story; he leaned forward, head in hands, to watch more closely.

The large ensembles act under Dressler’s tutelage, sing with musical direction by Roxanna Ward and perform choreography by Erika Whalen.

Scores of kids rotate choreographed roles as servants, New York denizens and orphans; many have backstage duties as well.

Among the Period One kids, Brigitte Naughton, as the frazzled Ms. Hanigan, is a smash in feather slippers.

Sandy the dog, played by Devin Kent, is a show stealer, bounding across the stage and joining Annie in an unexpected yowled duet in “Tomorrow.”

Kate Stewart, playing the primping crook Lily St. Regis (“named after the hotel”), alternately channels Adelaide from “Guys and Dolls” and Mae West.

Kiki Henderson, with the de rigueur bright red hair and frock, plays the title role with grace, focusing more on her role as plot catalyst than on the role’s preciousness.