YOUNGSTERS RELIVE ADVENTURE IN THEATER : YOUNGSTERS GIVING IT THEIR ALL IN VISTA

Injun Joe, the “murderin’ half-breed” in “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” stood sullen and menacing and lied to the townspeople that the town drunk, Muff Potter, was the killer.

Then the actor playing Injun Joe placed his hands on his hips and waited for the other cast members to deliver their lines. The lapse in character from villain to uncertain actor betrayed Sean Tamburrino as a novice.

Tamburrino, a tackle on the Vista High football team, is more at home this time of the year at summer practice smashing opposing linemen. But Tamburrino’s best friend, Eric Kunze, who is playing Huck Finn, persuaded him to try out for a role in the Moonlight Amphitheatre children’s production of a musical adaptation of Mark Twain’s classic tale.

They and 88 others, 8 to 18, are performing in or working on the set crew of “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” which opens Sunday at 8 p.m. at the amphitheater in Vista’s Brengle Terrace Park. Performances run through Wednesday.

Director Grace Ann Etcheberria-Jacobs is charged with coordinating the 90 children and teen-agers into a cohesive musical production.

The children’s theater began in 1986 but had its seed planted the year before with Moonlight Amphitheatre’s production of “The Sound of Music.”

“We saw almost 100 children for the seven roles,” artistic director Kathy Brombacher said. “Mothers kept calling to ask if there was something they could enroll their children in.”

Those associated with the program put their heads together and decided they would try a show performed by youths.

They experimented in 1986 with “Cinderella.”

“It did very well as a program; with the fee we charged for the workshop ($60) and the box office receipts, it paid for itself,” Brombacher said. Children’s theater is not all performing. The young cast learns how to transform cardboard boxes into eerily realistic tombstones, using only aluminum foil and shoe polish, or to make creepy vines from pipe cleaners.

Jamie Malone grew up before the children’s program began last summer. But at 20, she is practiced as an actress and a stage hand. Malone, who is volunteering her help backstage for “Tom Sawyer” while dancing in another show in Escondido, remembers the terror she felt when she first offered to help her father build a set three years ago.

“He’s the master carpenter for the theater, and I just wanted to impress him,” she said. Malone was petrified that she would make a mistake. “He told me to make this 6-foot platform for ‘Guys and Dolls.’ I was scared I would ruin it.” But she was forced to finish the job.

Today, Malone pumps wood screws into 1-by-3 pine boards with the skill of a veteran. “The hardest part is not being afraid to just do it,” she said.

Tamburrino, who also throws the discus and shot put and sings in the Vista High Meister Singers, feared that he would never get the role. But he did and is glad because “I’m the only one,” he said. “I’m the villain of the play. I’m more of an original.”

Tamburrino and the rest of the cast and crew participated in two weeks of theater workshops before rehearsals began in July. The students learned about stage movement, voice, makeup, lighting and other elements of stagecraft.

“We learned that how you stand on stage gives off something to the audiences,” Tamburrino said. “We learned that the expressions on your face can give a certain depth or a different idea each way you present yourself.”

As for the four-hour rehearsals, four days a week, Tamburrino said, “There’s no screwing around because . . . the performance has to be like clockwork.”

Not all the kids get to be on stage or want to be on stage. Eleven work as set crew, hanging and focusing lighting instruments, building sets and doing anything else the director asks of them.

“It’s twice as hard for a girl,” said Suzie Kose, 17. “But once they accept you, it’s ‘Go get that heavy thing,’ just like one of the guys. Actors have it easy compared to the technical people.”

Etcheberria-Jacobs has a younger cast this year than in 1986. A number of the leads are under 16. She also cast a lot more boys when she scheduled “Tom Sawyer.”

“Boys are different,” she said. “I think girls take dance or ballet and they’re used to waiting. Boys don’t know how to stand still. It’s a matter of teaching them the discipline of the theater”--not an impossible task, she said, especially with the aid of the older children.

But why do the students sign up for a month of rehearsals that take up such a large hunk of a summer’s day?

For Tamburrino, it’s the novelty. “You meet a lot of new people. It’s very fun.”

Kose likes being on the stage crew for similar reasons. “I like hard work. It’s long hours. I live on two to three hours of sleep. But I think it’s more the people.”

For Kunze it’s the performance. “I like performing for people. I get pleasure out of it. All the hard work--it’s worth that for just a couple minutes of applause.”