When the school bell rings most students head home while a certain few head towards the auditorium to rehearse for an upcoming play. They gather by the front seats close to the door, setting their bags down and chatting amongst themselves.
On one particular rehearsal day two weeks before the play’s opening, drama teacher and play director Molly Meacham sat close to the stage waiting as students trickled in. Soon the actors were called to the back getting their mics properly placed by members of Stage Krew. They lined up on stage as their names were called for a mic check where they repeated a line over and over as adjustments were made. With their mics in place actors made their way to their places preparing to do an entire run through of the play.
‘The Plot, Like Gravy, Thickens’ opened Oct. 23 and runs its final show Oct. 26.
The play itself revolves around a birthday dinner gone wrong when Edward Worthington, the birthday boy, turns up dead. The murder mystery mixes humor and suspense as the story is being told by Walter, the playwright’s alter ego, as he uncovers the secrets of all the guests or rather suspects.
After reading about 25 to 30 plays Meacham chose the thriller comedy in the spirit of Halloween.
“It’s a spooky season, and I did want to do a murder mystery, but maybe a murder mystery that doesn’t take itself terribly seriously,” Meacham said. “The characters take themselves seriously, but the script doesn’t.”
Soon after, auditions were held, and senior Constance Fraid, who is one of the actors for Justine Worthington, said they were relatively relaxed compared to most auditions like the one last year.
“We would be called in and just perform a scene, either on our own or with two other people, reading whatever characters we wanted,” Fraid said. “We had a selection to choose from. And then we would just perform that scene with people. And then I believe we also performed a monologue as well.”
Her character, Justine Worthington, is the bitter ex-wife of Edward and the mother of his only child. The character spends the entire play with a rude attitude and a cigarette in her fingers making the character more enjoyable to play.
“I have a lot of fun because I get a fancy little cigarette holder and a fake cigarette, and I get to basically chain smoke for the majority of the show,” Fraid said. “And just that little thing has just added so much to my character, where it’s just like, Oh she’s got issues, but she’s like, she’s classy, yeah? And it’s just really fun.”
Edward Worthington is a bitter old man but his strong personality brings junior Jacob Ballard, one of the actors playing this role, some excitement.
“I know he’s not a great guy, but he’s kind of fun to play just because he’s a very snarky old man, and he’s very energetic,” Ballard said. “So it’s just fun to play because he’s so full of himself, you know? And I think that’s the most fun part.”
With most plays actors take their script and memorize their lines to perfection, but this play has an improv section that involves answering questions made by the actual audience. This section causes some minor worries for Meacham.
According to Ballard, this section is in some ways restricted to ensure the questions are appropriate.
“It’s like a question-answer section that sort of includes the audience, but there have been some questions that keep getting brought up,” Ballard said. “So there probably will be plants from the other cast anyway, just so that we can mitigate and make sure that students don’t get too out of hand with the questioning.”
For Fraid, any initial worries were swept away as she hoped for a successful performance.
“I just hope that the show goes well, without a hitch,” Fraid said. “I hope nothing goes wrong. I hope we sell a lot of tickets, yeah, just hoping that everything runs smoothly.”
