Beginning her performance career at second grade, Erin Ryan, Div. 667, has always liked performing. On her performance resume, Ryan has done choir, dance, and drama. But personally, Ryan prefers drama.

“The feeling on stage is just so fun,” Ryan said.  “I like acting but when it gets down to the performance, I like that energy you get before you go onstage; It’s nerve wracking but exciting. When you get onstage you just don’t want to get off.”

Ryan aspires to be like one of the SNL women. She wants to be a comedic writer as a career. During her Lane drama career, she has performed in “Kiss Me Kate,” “The Good Doctor”, and the Lane Play Festival. In last year’s Play Festival, Ryan wrote “Popcorn, Dads, and Dates” and directed “Mr. and Mrs. B.”

“It was different because I’m used to performing but this time I was behind the scenes. It was really cool seeing what I wrote come to life,” Ryan said.  “I thought it was going to be a lot easier directing than it actually was. But it was really fun starting off figuring out who you’re going to cast and then the final product. You helped put that product together. It was really cool.”

Due to four AP classes, Ryan will not be performing in this year’s musical, “Footloose.” But Ryan is currently participating in an improv class in a comedy club; she has to audition for her spot on the program. Out of 60 who auditioned, Ryan was one of the 13 who got to participate in the class. It is a teen ensemble and she will be writing her own sketches to perform.

“At Second City, we did an exercise where we played a sport, like a tennis match or a basketball game. It’s all fake and we’re pretending,” Ryan said. “At the end of it, we were all panting and super exhausted. We were like, ‘This is why we’re actors and not athletes.’ We’re all so out of shape.”

Ryan will be performing at Second City at the end of March.

Until then Ryan plans as her final act at Lane, to be in next year’s play, musical, and Play Festival.

Ryan likes drama so much is because of its atmosphere and the people.

“What’s cool about acting is that everyone’s weird and I like weird people,” Ryan said. “The weirdest thing I’ve ever done were my elementary school plays, I played an alien with unibrow with a Russian accent–that was a pretty weird character–and I’ve played Ron Weasley. The characters I always end up playing during performances are the weird ones. But it’s okay, I’m good at playing weird.”