Every year, the advanced theater class gets to write, direct, and star in a play they create from scratch. This year it was TBD; To Be Decided, or Theater Bouta Die, or Trystan’s Birthday. The play included eight scenes and spanned a little over an hour. The play premiered April 22nd after having to be rescheduled due to inclement weather.
The first scene was titled “Drama Boosters” and opened the show with praise for an integral part of the Millbrook theater department. The Drama Boosters are a set of parents who work towards funding the theater department. This scene included a majority of the cast as they pay their respects to these “prophets” who help them succeed. They even included their beloved stage manager Nate Baker Sample, who isn’t in the class, but they decided must be in the scene. One of the shared themes between all scenes in this play is the narrative that theater teacher Mr. K has been arrested for lantern trafficking, a reference to their teacher’s passion and hobby for collecting vintage lanterns, and they are adjusting without him while navigating through the loss of funding for the arts departments in their school.
The second scene was titled “Thank You”, alluding to a common phrase used by “Theater Kids”. During rehearsal, you often hear “Thank You ___” or “Thank you five!” or “Thank you stage!” This skit was to explain these phrases in a way that still mocks the absurdity of it. This scene starred Rowyna Kindl, Dottie Faircloth, and Kael Alley. The actors very clearly understand the confusion people experience because of their phrases and play the scene hilariously. Vix Mahaney played the interpreter to the confused student played by Noah Finerghty.
The third scene was titled “Cold War.” This skit shows a time where there is a clash between the performing arts at Millbrook, as they share the stage in preparation for their final rehearsal, while maintaining their differences. This scene includes the whole cast. The band has comically left their one and only spokesperson, Ashley Rachlin, to fend for herself in the battle of the arts. The choir members were yelling at the dancers, while the dancers would yell at the tech crew and so on and so forth. The snarky comments made from each art department was especially funny considering some actors are also in the other programs. When asked their favorite part about doing the class play, senior Rowyna Kindl said, “The humor that students can come up with is so much funnier to us than like pre-written humor, and it was very personal to us.”
The fourth scene titled “Roaches” was a cast favorite. It starred everyone and made fun of the people known for skipping their classes in the auditorium. Mr. K likes to call them “roaches” so the cast made a whole scene out of it. The “roaches” are infamous to anyone in the theater program and gave the audience a pretty big laugh. How could you not, considering they all had roach antennas on?
The fifth scene entitled “t41t3” or in more simple terms “taite,” starred Taite Capes pointing out his obsession with theater, especially the indie and niche stuff, but dramatizing it into a funny but nonetheless creepy skit. As everyone else in the fictional theater class goofs off again and again, Taite becomes more angry and borderline unhinged about theater and respecting its art after they name overly “mainstream” plays and pop culture references, which he doesn’t consider ‘real theater’. Watching Capes spiral into insanity was a little horrifying due to the accuracy and commitment to the show.
In the sixth scene titled “Techies Are Gone,” Dottie Faircloth, Trystan Smith, Matthew Chapin and Noah Finerghty play absent minded theater kids who are trying to navigate the theater world without their tech crew. When one of the “techies,” played by Simone Doerner, appears and sees the absolute havoc they have caused, she freaks out and runs to fix everything as the actors run away in fear. They wrote this scene to pay their respects to the commonly overlooked hard work “techies” do for them, while also acknowledging what life would be like without them: a disaster.
The seventh scene shifts moods from its comedic predecessors by very literally being tilted “Serious.” Dima Alawar, Kael Alley, Tristan Corbett, Taite Capes and Zae Suggs, all gave very emotional stories on what theater means to them and what it has done for them. To close the show they present their eighth and final scene “Musical”. This scene included the whole cast as they compiled a bunch of famous musical theater songs and dances. They realize they are “All In This Together” to break Mr. K and Mr. Edwards, the technical theater teacher, out of jail. At the end Mr. K and Mr. Edwards make surprise appearances and are freed from jail!
The 2025 class play was a very successful event and an enjoyable experience. I know we are all excited to see what they come up with next year!
