On November 17th, 18th, 19th, BASH held it’s performance of Louisa May Alcott’s award winning novel, Little Women. Along with thoughts on the play, this article contains an exclusive interview with student director, Julia Duncan.
For those who don’t know, Little Women is a coming of age story placed in 1860’s Massachusetts. The story is based off the protagonist, Jo, and follows her, along with her 3 sisters as they deal with the the transition into adulthood.
Little Women is very emotionally fueled. The actors ability to portray this emotion can make or break a performance. This being said, the actors knocked it out of the park, from Beth March’s (played by Sophia Berger) weakness due to sickness being portrayed even in a subtle change of speaking voice, to Aunt March’s (Allison Shapin) stuck-up and dismissive attitude. The lead of the play Jo March (played by Lexie Hammill) was an exceptionally spectacular performance to watch, perfectly portraying the her disdain for more traditional roles being a woman and allowing the strong delivery of scenes like her goodbye to Beth or her rejection of Theodore “Lawry” Lawrence.
The best showcase of acting in the whole play would have to be the aforementioned rejection scene. Sam Elliot, playing Lawry, did the best possible job in portraying someone who felt equally in pain, in love, and betrayed.
“We have a lot of Actors in Boyertown.” Julia Duncan said, “So many people who enjoy acting, but only know about the musical and get discouraged.” There are only two plays throughout the year that aren’t musicals, one in fall and one in spring. “Our music program is very competitive and if you’re not the best, if you’re not a triple threat you can’t get in the musical and you can’t have your acting skills shown.” Julia Duncan hopes that others will consider joining stage crew or the drama club to, “the play is an opportunity for our actors of the school to at least get audition experience and we are very close-knit group it’s fun and it’s only an hour after school.”
The spring time play will be held later this year and will be a performance of ‘8 Minutes Left’ by E.B. Lee. I sincerely hope you consider attending to witness the amazing showings that so many of our students work on.
