Every year, Thespians hold Night of Scenes, where students perform One Acts — a play with only one act — as the name implies. The Advanced Repertory class take over and direct their own performances, including finding scripts, or writing them, creating the cast list and blocking the performance.

Many of the students are new to the directing position.

“I’ve done it with myself and my own group, but I’ve never had the chance to sort of direct and it’s tiring. It’s very, very tiring,” junior Elizabeth Bean said. “But it pays off. It really does, because you put so much work into something and you sort of both anticipate and dread the outcome, or some anticipation but also a little dread.”

A few of the groups have chosen to write their scripts, with some having experience in that field. Inspiration can come from many places, and for some it’s as simple as a puppet.

“[It’s] completely and utterly based off of a puppet that we wanted to use as a prop,” junior Danny Montanez said.  

“Downstairs, someone had a puppet in their scene from Drama One, and Danny and myself came up with the script solely based around this pink ostrich Marionette puppet,” added Bean.

Auditions were held last week, and many students tried out for the various acts.

“There were a lot of people we wanted and everyone did a really good job but once we found our cast, it’s [been] a lot of fun to work with [them]. They all seem to work really well together,” senior Victor Eberle said.

The directors have been working well with their cast, and have enjoyed much of the practices. Some of the directors were surprised at how well the cast fit their roles.

“They are all surprisingly just like their characters. And I think it’s perfect,” junior Zero Ritz said.

With all of the directors having experience in acting in the Night of Scenes, they know how much fun it is to perform a short play that has less pressure on the actors.

“You’re able to do things that you wouldn’t be able to do in one of our big productions, while also having that structure that is good in a play environment,” senior Chase Glasscock said. “You’re able to develop your skills, maybe even like, the weirder skills in acting, without having that pushback that might normally come with a very strict director or with a lot of time.”