Not only was the high school one act ‘That was Then’ successful at VTA, but so was Thomas Harrison’s one act play ‘937.’

Matt Schaeffer, a seventh grader in the one act, was astounded at how well they had done at VTA.

“We thought we had gone overtime so we thought we were going to get silver, but it turned out we didn’t [and we got gold] and [then] we got top three, which our school had never done before, so that was just amazing, we were all screaming,” Schaeffer said.

Anna Rath
Besides winning gold and top three, four actors were selected as all-star cast and one actress was selected as outstanding actress. Sydney Shaver was selected as outstanding actress at VTA.

“[I play] Elise, and she’s like this proper young lady at the beginning and she’s pretty moody, and she falls in love with Jacob,” Shaver said.

Director Michael Strawderman believes the results at VTA this year were better partially because of the genre change of the production.

“I’ve noticed a lot of the times that the productions that go to the middle school play festival, judges tend to always head towards the dramatic as opposed to the comedic, and we’ve done comedic the past couple of years, so I figured I had a group of actors who were probably strong enough to handle this challenging piece,” Strawderman said.

Strawderman had read through several pieces and had been drawn to this specific production because it related to the situation going on in our world currently.

“I think it struck me primarily because it was a very timely piece dealing with the Jewish refugee kind of situation that was happening in the late 1930’s early 40’s, and it kind of struck me as kind of the similar situation that we are dealing with in our world with refugees who are fleeing their home,” Strawderman said.

Because of the more serious atmosphere of the production, Schaeffer said the hardest part of the play was the amount of emotion that had to be put into the play to make it as powerful and good as it needed to be.

Anna Rath
“I have just escaped Dachau,” Schaeffer said. “Dachau is a concentration camp, and I’m on the ship to freedom and I find out we’re going back to Germany and I end up killing myself,” Schaeffer said.

Several challenges were faced but nothing the cast couldn’t overcome.

“I think the hardest part was, one, doing a drama and being able to get the kids to play the emotions as honestly as they could, challenging them to put themselves in the shoes of the characters and making their emotions as honest and as real as they probably could. It’s always a challenge when you’re taking a show on the road to be able to design a set that can easily be set up and torn down and not add a lot of stress to the actors who sort of serve as stage crew as well,” Strawderman said.

For Shaver, the play includes a mental transition as well as a set-up transition.

Anna Rath
“Happy musicals and plays, you don’t really have to get in the zone before you go, you just have to be happy and show that, but [when performing dramatic plays and musicals], you have to get in a zone and think as the character before you go on stage,” Shaver said, “[I prefer] more serious and dramatic.”

Schaeffer enjoyed the experience and believes it opened up a new perspective.