Photo credit: Mia Frenduto and Hannah Phillips[/caption]Zombie Prom may star a dead character, but the show itself is quite the opposite. It’s lively and fun, and it reveals a never-before-seen side of many actors who are regulars on the OHS stage. For example, junior Luke Taylor, a staple in the Orange theatre program, is secretly an accomplished singer with a rich, deep voice. OHS Assistant Principal Will Okun has a voice-over cameo as a television announcer, and other teachers have roles on stage. Giving teachers a chance to act with students is a new idea that worked out successfully. Taylor hopes to give more teachers roles in upcoming plays. The performances are Friday at 7 pm, Saturday at 2 and 7 pm, and Sunday at 2 pm in the auditorium. Tickets are $10.
The story follows the love story of Jonny Warner (Caleb Tolin) and Toffee (Anastasia Zitko). Jonny is an orphan who enrolls at Enrico Fermi High School, a school focused on nuclear power since it’s close to a plant. He is immediately targeted by the principal, Delilah Strict (Nunna Noe) for wearing a jacket with his name on it that’s missing the “h” often found in his name. He meets Toffee, falls in love, and the rest is history.
A few months later, the story picks up again. Toffee’s parents, played by teachers Alia Granger and Robert Griffin, tell her not to date Jonny. Under pressure, she breaks up with him and he kills himself by jumping into the nuclear waste dump near the school. Toffee is extremely upset that he’s dead, and after three weeks of mourning her friends start telling her to move on and find another date. The senior prom is coming up, and everyone but her is obsessed with it.
She doesn’t want to move on yet, however, and wishes that Jonny could come back. Her wish comes true one day, when Jonny pops out of the ground in front of her and tells her he came back from the dead because he heard her call out to him. Confused and upset, she rejects him, and he urges her to reconsider. Jonny also attempts to return to the school, but Strict won’t let him because she doesn’t want a zombie bringing disorder to her highly-regarded facility.
A secondary love story, that is tied to the first in a startling way revealed in the play’s final moments, stars Strict and Expose editor Eddie Flagrante (Luke Taylor). Eddie is a journalist who will do anything to get a story, and he jumps at the chance to cover Jonny’s struggles as a zombie. When he meets Strict, he realizes that she’s a former lover from high school. Both Taylor and Noe give standout performances, and their characters are two of the best characters in the play.
Noe described her character as the “zany, loud, tyrannical dictator of her school” who is “in charge” and “tells it like it is, or at least how she thinks it is.” She said Strict and Eddie have a “complicated” relationship. Taylor said that Eddie is a “flagrant” editor whose “main purpose at the start of the show is to get his stories.”
Director Jared Taylor thought Friday’s performance went “really, really well,” although the “first night always has its share of hiccups.” One of those hiccups were some mic problems that mainly affected Zitko. Lights and sound operator Jay Huskins said that “we will rectify any mistakes” for the Saturday and Sunday shows. Other technical aspects were brilliant, especially the lighting, and the sound problems were fixed by the second half of the show. Tolin said that “people should come to see the tech. The lighting for this show is so cool. There were thousands of dollars spent on the equipment that we are using and it shows.” Noe thought the first show was “amazing” and Assistant Director Maggie Cummings said that she believes “Nunna and Luke are two of the best characters in the entire show.” OHS alumna Katherine Kirkman called the show “very good.”
Taylor was “super excited” about the teacher involvement and he also emphasized that many aspects of the show were run by students, including the band, lights, sound, and make-up. Along with the aforementioned teacher cameos, English teacher Ashley Benners appeared as Sheila, a secretary.
0 comments