Just as local gardens are unveiling their roses, Thomasville On Stage & Company is preparing to open the curtain on the Tony Award-winning musical, “The Secret Garden,” as its springtime production.

Based on the beloved classic of children’s literature, this haunting drama tells the story of young Mary Lennox, an orphaned girl who is suddenly removed from her life in colonial India and sent to live with her reclusive uncle Archibald in a lonely manor on the moors of England. She soon finds herself caught up in a world of dark family secrets when she discovers the overgrown ruin of a garden which once belonged to her uncle’s deceased wife, Lily. 

With the help of new friends, Mary learns that with care and tenderness, even the saddest stories can bloom into something beautiful. In this tale of mystery, loss, and redemption, she becomes the family’s only hope for a new beginning.

The show was written by Marsha Norman and Lucy Simon and will be directed for TOSAC by Donna Mavity, with music direction by Trey Cox.

Performance dates are April 21-23 and 29-30, with the show’s final weekend coinciding with Thomasville’s 96th Annual Rose Show Festival.

The cast features talent from around the region, including Thomasville, Tallahassee, and the surrounding areas. Mavity says she is thrilled to be returning to TOSAC again, having last directed the company’s 2004 production of “Swingin’ on A Star.” Trey Cox, owner and artistic director of Versa Musica Conservatory in Thomasville, will be making his music directing debut with TOSAC. Cox is a veteran of several Broadway national tours as music director/conductor and pianist for “Les Miserables” and “Young Frankenstein,” among others.

Thomasville audiences will recognize a number of familiar local performers, including Rebecca Fadell, Peyton Hodges, Hananel Jackson, Sean Landeta and Mosisah Mavity. Fifth graders Bosie Miles from Brookwood and Ransom Young from Thomas County Central Middle School appear as cousins Mary Lennox and Colin Craven, around whom the haunting tale of tragedy and renewal revolves.

“Even though the storyline closely follows the classic novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett, the musical’s book author and lyricist Marsha Norman took some delightful liberties in interpretation,” noted Mavity of the stage version. “She created a chorus of ghosts of young Mary’s past who can be at once eerie and sympathetic and who appear throughout to move this haunted family toward peace and resolution.”

“So now we get to meet ghostly versions of characters like Lily, young wife to the haunted misanthrope master of Misselthwaite Manor Archibald Craven, Mary’s mother and father, Albert and Rose, and even her Indian servants,” the director added. “These characters were only mentioned in the novel. In the musical, they play integral rolesand have some of the most beautiful songs.”

Show times are April 21-22 at 8 p.m., April 23 at 2 p.m., two shows on Saturday April 29 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. and Sunday April 30 at 2 p.m.

Performances take place at TOSAC’s Storefront Theater at 117 S. Broad St. in downtown Thomasville. Tickets are $15 for adults and $12 for students, available at www.tosac.com or by calling (229) 226-0863.