The Theatre Department produces five productions each season which includes a musical, winter play, spring play, freshman/sophomore play, and student directed one acts. Our students build sets, hang/focus lights, run sound, work in the costume shop, and stage manage all the productions. Our shows have been invited to perform at the Illinois High School Theatre Festival and The King And I was a finalist for Best Production at the 2018 Illinois High School Musical Theatre Awards.
Thursday, October 24th 7:30pm Auditorium
Saturday, October 26th 1:00pm and 7:30pm Auditorium
Tickets for The Little Mermaid will go on sale Monday, October 14th at Noon
Based on one of Hans Christian Andersen's most beloved stories and the classic animated film, Disney's The Little Mermaid is a hauntingly beautiful love story for the ages. With music by eight-time Academy Award winner, Alan Menken, lyrics by Howard Ashman and Glenn Slater and a compelling book by Doug Wright, this fishy fable will capture your heart with its irresistible songs, including "Under the Sea," "Kiss the Girl" and "Part of Your World."
Ariel, King Triton's youngest daughter, wishes to pursue the human Prince Eric in the world above, bargaining with the evil sea witch, Ursula, to trade her tail for legs. But the bargain is not what it seems, and Ariel needs the help of her colorful friends, Flounder the fish, Scuttle the seagull and Sebastian the crab to restore order under the sea.
The Little Prince may have returned to his own tiny planet to tend his Rose and look after his Sheep, but for a short enchanted time he returns to us and comes alive on stage. This play/musical tells the story of a world-weary and disenchanted Aviator whose sputtering plane strands him in the Sahara Desert and a mysterious, regal "little man" who appears and asks him to "Please, sir, draw me a sheep." During their two weeks together in the desert, the Little Prince tells the Aviator about his adventures through the galaxy, how he met the Lamplighter and the Businessman and the Geographer, and about his strained relationship with a very special flower on his own tiny planet. The Little Prince talks to everyone he meets: a garden of roses, the Snake and a Fox who wishes to be tamed. From each he gains a unique insight which he shares with the Aviator: "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly." "What is essential is invisible to the eye." At length, both the "little man" and the Aviator must go home—each with a new understanding of how to laugh, cry, and love again.
Amongst the rubble of a bombed out village in the Caucasus Mountains, in the Soviet Republic of Georgia, The Chalk Circle, is based on a Chinese parable. The story begins in the midst of a revolution, the Governor is executed and his wife must flee. In the chaos their infant son Michael is left behind. When no one else will take responsibility for the child, a servant named Grusha takes him up and goes on the run. The next three years unfold in a series of episodes showing how Grusha and Michael survive. As always, Brecht explores contradictions in his work, prying open the two sides to every transaction and probing the reasons people act against their own self-interest, while others blindly pursue it. Grusha nearly leaves the baby with a peasant couple but cannot against her better judgement. As Brecht wrote in his notes, “The more Grusha does to save the child’s life, the more she endangers her own,” (Brecht, Collected Plays: Seven 304). She takes refuge with her brother for a time, but is not welcomed by her sister-in-law, and though she had promised to wait for her true love Simon Chachava, she must marry someone else so she and Michael can survive. The story shifts gears and we learn how Azdak, a clever but corrupt judge, has used his wits to keep his position during the years of revolution and war, and finally after the restoration of the old regime. Ultimately it is he who will hear the suit of the Governor’s wife, who has returned from exile and wants her son back. If she can prove Michael is hers, he is the key to power and will be heir to the dead Governor’s estate. With a habit of drinking on the job, a propensity for taking bribes, and a reputation for ruling in favor of the underdog, Azdak must decide which mother has a better claim to the child’s custody, or rather he must determine, “the child’s claim to the better mother.” He devises the chalk circle test, a circle is drawn on the floor around Michael, and the two contestant mothers must each take a hand and try to pull the boy out. When Grusha lets go, it is clear that she is the better mother.
Friday and Saturday, April 25th and 26th
7:30 p.m. Auditorium
Michael Frayn's Noises Off takes a fond look at the follies of theatre folk, whose susceptibility to out-of-control egos, memory loss, and passionate affairs turn every performance into a high-risk adventure. This play-within-a-play captures a touring theatre troupe’s production of Nothing On in three stages: dress rehearsal, the opening performance, and a performance towards the end of a debilitating run. Frayne gives us a window into the inner workings of theatre behind the scenes, progressing from flubbed lines and missed cues in the dress rehearsal to mounting friction between cast members in the final performance. Brimming with slapstick comedy, Noises Off is a delightful backstage farce, complete with slamming doors, falling trousers, and -- of course -- flying sardines!
