The lessons I brought home from this workshop were legion. I had learned that people work best when they know they are really appreciated. I soon discovered that teens would work even more brilliantly when they knew they were loved unconditionally for themselves and with no motive other than to create excellence together as a group. I firmly believe that people do not improve because they are told what they are doing that is wrong (maybe dancers are an exception—they thrive on corrections, if there is praise for improvement). The improvement comes when they are given ownership of their product and are encouraged and praised whenever they embellish the role which has become their own “creation.” And I learned a great deal about scenic construction because the scene builder was a gifted craftsman if not a specialist in set decoration.
So I had been able to teach that last year at Eastern Hancock High School with a fervor of dedication and open affection. And after the initial difficulties, I was also able to approach the drama at Southwestern with a joy that was to “give me wings.” But success did not come overnight.
* * *
The Southwestern Senior Class let me know from the start of the project that I was not going to please them. I gave them a list of four plays to choose from. Refusing to consider them, they argued with me. One said, “Why can’t we do the play they were going to do last year?” It was one of those things that are written for high schools, which have never gone through the honing process of a professional performance.
I said, “Don’t ask me to do something that is beneath me.” Ooh, did that ever strike a nerve with many of them. Then someone pointed out that the departed teacher had promised them Cheaper by the Dozen. “That’s a delightful play,” I countered. “Let’s do that.” And we did. They argued about tryout times. I gave in—even came at 6:30am for those who were unable to come other times, yet no one came. In fact, after the first day of tryouts, the popular kids put out the message that no one was to try out. I believe there were eighteen parts and that was exactly the number of people who tried out. By changing Jackie, the youngest boy, to Jackie, the youngest girl, I had enough to cast it without begging or cajoling.
Sometime later while I was working on the set, the Spanish teacher, Marcia Berner, stopped by the small stage at one end of the gym on her way to the parking area. “You’re lucky,” she stated pleasantly.
“I beg your pardon–”
“You’re lucky. When I was directing the senior play three years ago, I asked for permission to paint the scenery, and they said, ‘Certainly not! It has only been three years since that scenery was painted.’”
“I don’t know how much luck was involved.” I grimaced and chuckled, “Honestly, I just didn’t know I was supposed to ask.”
* * *
I not only painted that set, but I borrowed pieces I had accumulated at Eastern. I used the most elaborate and colorful stencil design I could come up with. Only two of the cast members were in my classes, none was overly dramatic, and some brought skateboards and Frisbees to the first rehearsal. Since no one had shown up to work on scenery the first session, I made them put up their toys and work on the set. I told them, quoting the Bard,”’The play has to be ‘the thing.’ You will have many chances to throw Frisbees and ride skateboards in the years to come, but for most of you, this will be the last chance to be in a play.” The next evening there were no boys at practice; the girls said they had all quit.
Thus I came to realize that we were not going to have one of my finest productions. What was most important was that we were going to do that play. They felt I was arrogant and told me so. I guess I had been too eager to do things my way. At school the next day, as I saw the boys in the hall, I said, as cheerfully as possible, “See you tonight!”
I had spent three lonely weeks after school and during my prep periods scraping and scrubbing wallpaper off the flats (units of scenery). Jamie, the boy who was assigned to play the father role, was so proud when he told me that his mother had volunteered to wallpaper the set. I may have shrieked at him, but I certainly had hoped never to see wallpaper on a set again. “If I wanted it papered, I’d do it myself. I am a professional paperhanger.” I shouldn’t have turned his offer aside so bluntly. I think I was still offended by their attitude that I had to be taught to do things the way they had always done (or not done) them.
Another boy had said, “You’ll never get the set to stand up.”
“To do what?” I queried, thinking I might have misunderstood.
“It won’t stand up. We tried everything last year. See that pipe up there? We even tried to wire it to that, but it didn’t work.”
“Well,” I explained, “it’s really pretty simple. You just build corners into the scene.”
Then I brought in an antique fireplace and an ornate newel post from a farm house that had been torn down and added a number of showy features, including the eight-color stencil. Once that scenery started to shape up, so did the actors. Robin, a hyperactive skateboard whiz, actually spent one whole evening with a paintbrush in his hand every possible moment when he wasn’t onstage, fascinated with the enlarged wallpaper pattern that was evolving as he worked. I have always maintained that “As the set goes, so goes the show.” Eventually the cast began to experience a feeling of accomplishment, but not before a few senior girls “tore me apart” in my first-period business English class one day.
