The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical ‘Oklahoma’ comes to the Ovation stage.

The original Broadway production of “Oklahoma!” featured a cast of mostly unknowns.

Even in a star-driven era, those at the helm of Richard Rodgers’ and Oscar Hammerstein’s 1943 musical followed an unconventional strategy of hiring singers who could act, not actors who could sing.

The result, with its iconic characters and songs that have embedded themselves into the theater-going consciousness, was an instant smash that ran for more than 2,000 performances and spawned major revivals on Broadway and in London, an Academy Award-winning film and countless school and community theater productions.

To Ovation Musical Theatre director Ron Milton, this is not without reason.

“It’s a seminal musical in the American musical canon,” he said. “Up to that point, musicals were all fluff. And ‘Oklahoma’ is a giant musical…it changed the face of American musical theater.”

Set in the 1906 Oklahoma Territory on the verge of statehood, the musical spins a deceptively simple yarn about farm girl Laurey and cowboy Curly’s pride-hampered romance, further hindered by the machinations of the dark-hearted farm hand Jud Fry.

Amidst the seeming innocence of fringed surreys and box socials, every character toils in his or her own way to earn a piece of the territorial pie. Gritty themes emerge in the show that Milton says aren’t always brought to the fore in community productions.

“Besides the great music, inside the dialogue there are lessons about just how hard life was inside the Indian territory,” he said.

“Oklahoma,” which opened last night at the Bainbridge High School theater, is Ovation’s 11th production. Grit and hard work factor into Milton’s approach to staging them all, as he applies a principle Stephen Sondheim put forth in “Sunday in the Park with George”:

“Having just a vision’s no solution. Everything depends on execution.”

So in Ovation’s world, the process of “putting it together,” as it were, involves a four-hour group audition, a full month with the music alone and rehearsal three times per week for two to three hours a pop until show time. Milton wants actors to become “unconsciously competent” in every aspect of performance.

As to the company itself, Milton likens Ovation to a European theater company comprised of a large, extended family that expands and contracts as members move in and out.

While many Ovation members reliably involve themselves in every production, Milton never pre-casts a show, especially not with the same actors playing the lead time and again. In a parallel to the original Broadway production, Ovation’s “Oklahoma” features six lead actors who are new to the company.

“It has to be okay to carry a water bucket one time, and carry lead dialogue the next,” Milton said.

Linda Owens, an Ovation regular since its inception who plays an ensemble member in Oklahoma, has a story about nearly every cast and crew member.

There’s a young actor who was spontaneously drawn into the audition when he accompanied his father; a girl whose mother is an Ovation regular but who is herself participating for the first time; and a woman who regularly sings but is handling props for this production.

With “Oklahoma,” Milton’s primary hope, as with any production, is that his work and that of his tight-knit cast and crew will result in not just entertainment, but elevation.

“Every time you do a work of art, you celebrate life,” Milton said. “And we hope to improve the human condition by creating art, not just a performance.”

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You can’t say no

Ovation! Musical Theatre presents Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma!”, directed by Ron Milton with musical direction by Corinna Lapid-Munter, July 13-29 at the Bainbridge High School Theatre. Show times are 7:30 p.m. Fridays through Sundays, with a Sunday matinee at 3 p.m. For tickets, see www.ovationmtb.com or call 842-0472.