It takes a lot to put together a theater production. From planning to opening day, non-stop effort is put into making the show the best it can be when that curtain goes up. Just ask Trish Everett.
The theater education and outreach master’s student is director of her own workshop production, “”Stop Kiss,”” written by Diana Son. To become the director of a workshop production, she had to apply through the UA School of Theatre Arts.
“”The theater department does three workshop productions a year: one in the fall, which is through the directing studio,”” she said. “”And then they have space for two in the spring time and students and faculty fill out an application and submit a proposal for a play they want to do.””
From there, a team of members from the different areas of theater production decided which play will be chosen.
“”Stop Kiss”” was Everett’s first choice.
“”It’s a show that has been on my directing queue list for some time,”” she said. “”I had seen it when I was in my undergrad and it’s just a very compelling story. The way that the timeline is fractured and sort of scattered up makes you wonder how something bad could happen to two seemingly normal girls and what exactly that something bad was, and throughout the whole play you piece the whole concept together.””
The next step was to select a cast.
“”We had auditions in January right after we got back from break,”” Everett said. “”We had open auditions and we wanted to see who would come, and it was mostly theater students, but we had a couple of out of the department.””
Sarah Finn, a creative writing junior playing the role of Sara, was originally drawn to the audition by a friend.
“”Initially, it was because my friend Jill was the stage manager, and she told me about the show, and it seemed interesting,”” she said.
Engel Indo, a Latin American studies sophomore playing Detective Cole, went to the auditions to fulfill one of his ambitions.
“”It’s always been my dream to do this,”” he said. “”I was in the military for 17 years and I never had a chance to pursue this. I started at UA this semester, and the first thing I did was take an acting class, one of those gen-ed acting classes. The teacher mentioned ‘Stop Kiss’ and they said we had to audition, and so I did it.””
Next, rehearsals began. The first rehearsal was used to show the cast the overall plan for the production.
“”We had all of the designers there,”” Everett said. “”Everybody sort of did a pitch for what they were thinking in terms of set design, lighting design, costume design. The actors kind of got to hear what we had been working on for the last couple of months while they were still doing whatever. Then we read through the script and timed it, and after that we just tried to get to know each other.””
The rehearsals give the actors a chance to find the style that will best fit their character.
“”It’s always just fun to be in rehearsal and try something different,”” said Danielle Hecht, a theater arts junior playing the role of Callie. “”And if it doesn’t work, that’s just one way you know that you don’t want to do it or you can take it in another direction.””
A few challenges have arisen in the early rehearsals. From the standpoint of a director, timing is one of the largest.
“”Scheduling has been the primary one,”” Everett said. “”A lot of my actors are in other plays, and one of my actors is directing one, so just fighting over actors has been a bit of a challenge, but everyone’s kind of made it work.””
From the actors’ perspective, getting into character has been the difficulty.
“”(Callie’s) a very awkward strange character who doesn’t really say what she means or does what she wants to do,”” Hecht said, “”and I tend to be kind of opposite of that.””
“”Sarah is a bit more feminine than I am,”” Finn said. “”Some of her reactions to things that Callie would say are different than how I would react. So I had to get to a more vulnerable place that Sarah comes from, cause she’s more na’ve than I am. That was a challenge, but Trish was really helpful.””
“”They all have been acting for awhile so they change their moods,”” Indo said about his fellow cast members. “”They change from one character to the next in a fraction of a second; it takes me forever to do it.””
However, Indo is receiving help from the cast and Everett.
“”They’re friendly, they’re beautiful people, they’re understanding,”” he said, “”and Trish is amazing. She gives me all these words of encouragement.””
