One student's 24 hours as a Witness thespian
While this may sound like an exhausting and strenuous process, being pressed for time somehow amped up the commitment in everyone involved, and what one might normally complain would take days if not weeks was accomplished within hours or even minutes. Fifteen minute shows were completely memorized within an hour or two. Blocking and characterization both spilled out seamlessly and effortlessly as everyone involved was forced to get to know the parts within the first read-through.
To give you an idea of what the shows are like, let me explain my experience. I personally was in Red Sox Nation and the Downfall of Society, written by Rob Kasten and Paxson Trautman. Mitch Frank was our director. In a nutshell, the play was a comedy about post-apocalyptic Pennsylvania where a girl (me) is trying out for an illegal Underground Powderpuff Penguin Football League.
As explained by the team captain (senior Julie Sihilling), the sport is illegal and underground due to the fact that Boston won all major sports titles for three consecutive years, angering God (a Phillies fan), bringing about the apocalypse and forcing a government ban on sports and sporting equipment. They use a penguin as a football because their way around the ban is to insert footballs up penguins' ... well, you get the picture.
As the two girls realize that the penguin-ball is in fact a bomb, and the locker room they're in is inescapable, the one-act spirals deeper and deeper into illogical absurdity. While this may sound a little crazy, the show was in fact very coherently put together, especially considering that the writers only had a night to write it and both are engineers. And who can find fault a play that includes the Soulja Boy dance and slimy spaghetti in a Ziploc bag?
The first show of the night was The Mountain, written by seniors Adar Eisenbruch and Sal Gentile. It was directed by junior Oleg Shik. In it, senior Chris Chuang played Samson, the overbearing husband, senior Amy Hellman played Guinevere, the fed-up princess housewife, senior Joe Micali played the prince she has an affair with, and Eisenbruch provided the voice for a talking deer head.
To give you an idea of what the shows are like, let me explain my experience. I personally was in Red Sox Nation and the Downfall of Society, written by Rob Kasten and Paxson Trautman. Mitch Frank was our director. In a nutshell, the play was a comedy about post-apocalyptic Pennsylvania where a girl (me) is trying out for an illegal Underground Powderpuff Penguin Football League.
As explained by the team captain (senior Julie Sihilling), the sport is illegal and underground due to the fact that Boston won all major sports titles for three consecutive years, angering God (a Phillies fan), bringing about the apocalypse and forcing a government ban on sports and sporting equipment. They use a penguin as a football because their way around the ban is to insert footballs up penguins' ... well, you get the picture.
As the two girls realize that the penguin-ball is in fact a bomb, and the locker room they're in is inescapable, the one-act spirals deeper and deeper into illogical absurdity. While this may sound a little crazy, the show was in fact very coherently put together, especially considering that the writers only had a night to write it and both are engineers. And who can find fault a play that includes the Soulja Boy dance and slimy spaghetti in a Ziploc bag?
The first show of the night was The Mountain, written by seniors Adar Eisenbruch and Sal Gentile. It was directed by junior Oleg Shik. In it, senior Chris Chuang played Samson, the overbearing husband, senior Amy Hellman played Guinevere, the fed-up princess housewife, senior Joe Micali played the prince she has an affair with, and Eisenbruch provided the voice for a talking deer head.
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