Behind the Curtain and On Stage: The Students Bringing SJS’s Winter Play to Life

“If you love Twilight, you will love watching the Winter Play.”

That’s sophomore Shelby Kuhl, one of the three stage managers for St. John’s School’s annual Winter Play. This year’s production was “Let the Right One In”, a romantic horror that combined elements of fear and love in a supernatural, vampire world. The play had three show nights from Jan 28 - 30, and rehearsals started in late November. This play made the audience reflect on who to trust and who to give their heart to.

“On the outside, it’s a horror story. But on the inside, it’s actually a really beautiful love story about innocence,” said sophomore Vivian Connelly, who plays the female lead, Eli, in the production.

Unlike most commonly known productions that are larger in cast numbers and stage size, the play occurred in St. John’s Black Box: an intimate space between the actors on stage and the audience watching. Although this setting was a daunting challenge for the small cast, it also provided a more personal cast connection experience.

For Kuhl, who first joined tech crew in middle school, the small theater was a main reason why she wanted to stage manage the Winter Play. She had the opportunity to make a unique connection with each actor, which is something less common with a bigger production. She advises that although the experience is extremely rewarding and fun, stage managing is a massive time commitment.

“In the end, it is such a ‘wow, we really did do this’ type of moment,” Kuhl said, “And it makes you feel amazing.”

Similarly, sophomore Ailey Takashima, who played a bully named Micke, loved the experience of getting closer to the other actors.

“Spending so much time together, we became a close-knit family,” Takashima said, “Our director, Ms. Julia Oppenheim, would drop the craziest stories in rehearsal, and we would bond over them because they’re so funny.”

For Takashima, she fell in love with theater early on and has participated in the fine arts every single year since then. Even though she considers herself a pretty introverted person, knowing that she has the theater community at her back has made her confidence grow so much more.

“It’s ironic because theater’s about becoming someone else, but I feel like it made me more comfortable being myself,” Takashima said.

Likewise, acting is a huge part of who Connelly is. Even at a summer program years ago, she remembers one thing that really resonated with her.

“Even if you’re in the ensemble, there is always going to be one person in the audience looking at you,” Connelly said, “And I thought about that there is somebody out there who’s going to look at the work you’re doing and see a little bit of themself in you, the character.”