Having two shows in one weekend is something the theater department hasn’t seen in a long time.
“The Outsiders,” directed by Bill Weaver, starts Thursday and runs through Saturday. Both showings will start at 7 p.m.
“Little Women,” adapted from Louisa May Alcott’s novel and Marian De Forest’s play, will be directed by Barbara Hilt and will be showing Friday at 7 p.m. and Sunday at 2:30.
The idea for the two shows at one time came from Hilt’s repertory theatre, which is offered in regular course classes.
The name “repertory theatre” implies a group of actors and technicians is performing a repertoire of productions and must alternate between performance material.
“I had 41 students enrolled in the repertory theatre, and to accommodate all of these actors, I needed a show that was going to work for all actors,” Hilt said. “I wanted my students to have dialogue and a tech job, so I wrote parts for everyone in Little Women to go along with The Outsiders.”
Rehearsals went from one show to another every other day, and some days both in one.
Sophomore Atticus Crow, who plays the lead Ponyboy Curtis in “The Outsiders,” said it has been a fun but challenging process.
“Switching between shows has really been a struggle,” Crow said. “It halves the amount of rehearsal time each show gets in the later stages of production, so it takes a lot of focus to hang on to the progress we have made.”
Ashton Tollison, who plays Aunt Carroll in “Little Women,” said she had more freedom to work through how their character works.
“For every show, we are given the task to think about our characters and who they are,” she said. “For ‘Little Women’, my character isn’t actually in the book, so I got a little more freedom with it. I got to decide my own mannerisms and who Aunt Carroll really is. I chose to make her very focused on manners and being polite and respectful, rather than being mean and snobby.”
Senior Tru Lawson, who is starring both shows, plays sweet-but-sour Cherry Vance in “The Outsiders.”
“I resonate with Cherry’s character a lot, as I have a lot of the same traits as her,” Lawson said. “Cherry is someone who naturally puts walls up and doesn’t let people disrespect her, but when the right person comes along, she can be her sweet and vulnerable self.”
Junior Ava Weaverling, who plays Amy March in “Little Women,” said she loved the character as played by Florence Pugh in the screen adaptation.
“I take a lot of inspiration from Florence Pugh,” Weaverling said. “Pugh’s body language when she was younger was more sporadic and grumpy, but as she grows, she becomes calm and motivated. I try my best to portray that change as well.”
