Madison Brill '12 and Jocelyn Goldberg '13 in "The Philadelphia". credit: Emily Sprayragen

After seven years at Hewitt, I’ve finally had the chance to see an Upper School Fall production as an audience member. Since coming to Hewitt in the sixth grade, I’ve either been an actor in the plays or a tech member. It was truly a treat to see this fall’s production from an audience’s point of view.

Drama teacher and director Mr. Denver always says that it’s important to make the audience feel something, because if you do you’ve in essence achieved the goal of good acting. Needless to say, I had goosebumps for the entirety of David Ives’ All in the Timing, this year’s Upper School fall production. It made me laugh. It made me grip the edge of my seat. It made me fall in love with art again. It achieved exactly what it needed to in a short amount of time.

From the first scene, “Sure Thing,” with Stephanie Reyes and Becky Aydin, I knew I was in for a great time. Though I’ve both seen and read “Sure Thing” several times, this performance was like watching the action for the first time. It was truly moving to become invested in a piece that didn’t feel reworked whatsoever, but rather new and unique.  Both actresseswere truly invested in the complicated and emotional scene.

Skye Malik '15, Jillian Philo '15, and Natalia Ryzak '15 in "Words, Words, Words". credit: Emily Sprayragen

In “Words, Words, Words,” the next scene starring Jillian Philo, Natalia Ryzak, and Skye Malik, the audience laughed from beginning to end. The three actresses invested themselves fully into the characterizations of monkeys stuck in a room forced to rewrite Hamlet, truly doing justice to the scene.

“Universal Language” was the third scene and, well, I just don’t know how Pauline Cronin, Marianelly Rios, and Alexandra Young did it!  Marianelly  didn’t speak English for the majority of the scene, but instead the Unamunda language, a mixture of unidentifiable sounds and Gibberish. Challenging though it was, their performances were great.

In “Mere Mortals” (a scene I’ve actually never seen or read before), Ahmerie Shihade, Zoe Stoller, and Julia Dunetz had such perfected accents and such accurate masculine behavior that  I believed everything I heard; I was transformed into their world, one of fantasy and musings on what life could be like.

I had been hearing for weeks from Madison Brill about how hysterical “The Philadelphia” was, so I had eagerly waited to see Madison, Jocelyn Goldberg, and Alexandra Young. Though I knew the premise of the plot, the scene was again hysterical and had me knocking into Sophia, who sat next to me, with laughter.

Finally, in “The Variations on the Death of Trotsky,” Alexandra Warrick, Kate English, and Rebecca Aydin gave stunning performances. As I watched Alex repeatedly die (a total of eight times), I thought about how difficult it is to do something repeatedly with increasingly dramatic repetitions. I was proud to know such talented actors.

 

The cast of 'All in the Timing'. credit: Emily Sprayragen

While it was a difficult decision to not do the show this year, All in the Timing was an amazing performance to see as an audience member for both the first and last times. I want to thank the actors for investing all they had and more into their characters- it made for a such a stunning show. I also want to congratulate the “techies,” as we like to call them: Johanna Ring, Maria Sabater, Cameron King, and Tessa Schorsch. Thank you for making it all seem so seamless, so magical. Lastly, I would like to congratulate Mr. Denver on his extremely successful 50th performance at Hewitt, which, according to Maria Sabater ’13, he announced “so nonchalantly,” at the end of Friday’s performance. It is because of his enthusiasm for and belief in his art that Hewitt can have such professional and enriching performances each year.

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