Lisa Martus (center) and Kristin Havrilla wait backstage with Josh Hardcastle during dress rehearsal. Their period costumes were loaned by Ferry Farm. mwm View More Images from this story Visit the Photo Place

Stafford High School students make their way through end-of-year theater production

Following the process of putting together a high-school theater production

By ADELE UPHAUS

Date published: 5/21/2004

By Adele Uphaus • The drama of production: Click here to see a multimedia essay (requires Flash plugin)

Editor's Note: Free Lance-Star reporter Adele Uphaus and photographer Mike Morones followed the Stafford Senior High School end-of-the-year theater production from auditions through opening night.

IT'S 2:30 p.m. The spring afternoons have gotten increasingly warm and sunny. Most of Stafford Senior High School has dispersed. But in the drama classroom, a group of students is convening.

Despite their differences, there is one thing that keeps them after school these spring afternoons.

It's theater.

Thousands of high schools around the country put on splashy end-of-the-year productions. It's an annual rite of passage.

But for these Stafford teenagers, this isn't just any end-of-the-year production. It's their end-of-the-year production, "She Stoops to Conquer," an 18th-century comedy of class, manners and mistaken identity by Oliver Goldsmith.

On the first day of auditions, they gather in the cavernous auditorium before a barren stage, waiting for instructions from Tom Clark, the director.

Despite its vast dimensions, the auditorium and the classroom that adjoins it, with its posters of London's South Bank (home of Shakespeare's Globe Theater) and banners from wins at past competitions, doesn't intimidate these kids.

Rather, it's where they feel safe and where they're all friends.

When senior Katelyn Cowen's family has to put their dog to sleep one day, everyone gathers around her to stroke her hair and rub her shoulder. Sophomore Austin Dolan is always getting his reddish hair tousled by two senior girls. Sophomore Josh Hardcastle and senior Sarah Perkins jokingly call each other "lovah," a nod to a Saturday Night Live sketch about hippie college professors.

The theater room is also where the teacher/student relationship softens. Clark is more like a father caring for a brood of ducklings than a teacher reigning over a classroom dictatorship. He jokes with them, telling Austin he needs to take his Ritalin, and they joke back, telling him he should go to France to learn how to be a gentleman.

Clark has sandy hair, speaks quickly and strides around with a purpose. He calls the kids "Guys, guys, guys" and tells them to "sit, sit, sit."

Follow us on

Read more stories about Fredericksburg
Date published: 5/21/2004