Student Theater For The "Short Attention Span"

It’s time for West Potomac High School’s Night of One Acts, opening to the general public on Friday.   After last year’s run, the school is presenting another fresh series of  six short plays selected by a team of theater students and their facilitator, WPHS alum Kristen Merek. 

One of the shorts in the evening’s presentation, Run Nigel Run, has been written by junior Robert Nichols.  Nichols is co-directing the play with senior Brian Goodspeed, who says that the play is 15 minutes long.  Nichols says, “It’s about a man named Nigel who happens to get fired twice in one day ... and he has a crazy psycho girlfriend so he’s trying to get his life together ... It’s a dramatic comedy.”  Nichols says he wrote the play on his own, outside of any class context, and that Goodspeed “helped my spelling a little.”  Nichols has studied drama since ninth grade.  Goodspeed says he got involved in theater “two months ago, because [Nichols] asked me to.”  In Run Nigel Run, senior Connor Chilton plays Nigel.  Junior Helen Custodio plays his fiancée, and senior Jennifer Paz portrays his mother.

Another short play, called Words Words Words by David Ives, is being directed by senior Madeline Evans.  “It’s about three monkeys trying to write Hamlet,” explains Evans.  She has cast Margaret Corum, Michaela Berkon, and Angela Robinson as the three monkeys.  All are in their senior year. 

Evans, who has been studying drama throughout her high school experience, says of West Potomac’s Night of One Acts, “It’s really impressive what we’ve been able to put together with just students directing.  It’s really our production.”  Evans adds that two of the one acts are student-written.  The plays, she says, are “are all very different, so it’s a great for the community to be able to see such a variety of theater for only $5.”

Corum adds, “[Night of One Acts] is good for a short attention span.”

“Each show has a different personality,” says Robinson.  “We’ve got monkeys, bank robbers, a restaurant from an alternative universe, a play about dating faux pas ...."

Evans clarifies that the play about dating is called Sure Thing, also by David Ives.  She says that the total duration of all the one acts will run about two hours with intermission.

WPHS’ Night of One Acts plays Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.