Message of Tartan High School's Spring Play Already Buzzing Through the Halls

It’s still more than two weeks until audiences will see the production of The Laramie Project, but the message of the school’s spring play has already permeated through the school’s halls, its directors and actors said before taking off for spring break.

The play tells the story of Matthew Shepard, a University of Wyoming student who was beaten and murdered in 1998. Witnesses said he was targeted because he was gay. The story is told through playwrights who are conducting interviews with people in Laramie, WY, where the murder occurred—a “play within a play” said Assistant Director Jodi Frovold.

“Erase Hate” is the play’s message, said director Ryan DeLaCroix. The message is now emblazoned on T-shirts that the drama group has been selling to other students, it has been incorporated into class discussions and it’s being felt through the support of fellow students in the wake of threats to protest the show.

The Westboro Baptist Church—known for protesting outside of soldiers’ funerals—said on its website that it would protest on opening night of the show.

“The kids that aren’t involved in theater and kids who don’t really care about it—they got really defensive when they heard about the church coming to protest,” said actress Nicole Lamm. “I think that they’re more supportive of this play than they have been of other ones.”

Earlier this year, the church issued a press release saying its members would protest Hastings High School’s production of The Laramie Project, but the City Pages reported that the protesters never showed.

The timing of the threatened protest—in the same month the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the church’s right to protest at soldiers' funerals—gave Tartan political science teacher Vicki Fellows an occasion to talk about the controversy surrounding the protests and the court ruling in class, she said.

“I think the kids are interested in supporting their peers in this performance,” she said. “I think there will be more discussion when we come back from spring break.”

Actress Emily Morley, said there’s buzz about the play in the school.

“The whole school has been involved with it,” she said. “It feels good to have the support of people that normally wouldn’t go see theater.”

The play is not just about tolerance for differences in sexual orientation, rather it’s about hatred and general prejudice, DeLaCroix said.

“It’s about two people who decided that because someone was different—maybe a different race, gay, straight, whatever—they decided that because they were different they were going to take them out and beat them,” he said.

DeLaCroix said he chose the show because he had a cast he knew could “do justice” to the story, and he wanted to give the seniors a chance to do a play with a strong cultural impact.

Frovold said the play really provides an opportunity for reflection on all types of hatred and bigotry.

“The whole basis of the show is to make the audience reflect on their own belief system,” she said. “There are many poignant lines that the cast will deliver to make people think.”

The Laramie Project opens at 7 p.m. March 31, at Tartan High School.