The University of Vermont will present The Spring Festival of Plays – The Senior One Acts 2022, April 23 and 24 at 2PM and 7:30PM in the Royall Tyler Theatre on the campus of the University of Vermont.

The Senior One Acts are an eagerly anticipated annual event in the department’s yearly production schedule. The one acts are produced and directed by members of the Senior Seminar class and are the culmination of four years of study in the Department of Theatre. Through the process of producing the one acts the students have an opportunity to apply collaborative and creative skills they’ve learned in during their years of study. These skills include organization, communication, and an understanding that in life, as in the theatre, we need each other in order to be fulfilled, productive, and successful. These necessary skills have been put to the test over the past semester for the students whose work you will experience in the Spring Play Festival.

This year’s program will feature ten diverse one act plays. Each one act will be presented twice over the weekend giving patrons an opportunity to join with these talented young theatre artists as they put into practice the skills they have learned and honed over their four years at UVM. Here is this year’s line-up:

Program A – presented Saturday, April 23 @ 7:30PM and Sunday, April 24 @ 2:00PM.

To Skip of Not to Skip
Written and directed by Celeste Piette
It’s first period. It’s AP Lit. It’s senior skip day. And two kids showed up.
Molly didn’t get the memo, and Chris can’t afford another absence. They are both extremely miserable. What better time for the teacher to attempt to lead a dramatic reading of Hamlet.
CAST:
Molly – Lily Coleman
Chris – Matt Haverty
Mrs. George – Rosalie Wasser
 
MEDUSA
Written and directed by Maggie McCloskey
A retelling of Ovid’s myth.
Medusa has been punished for a crime she did not commit and sent into exile with her sisters. Transformed and abandoned by the goddess Athena, for being attacked in her temple, Medusa must grapple with what has happened to her and what she has become: not quite human and not quite Gorgon. Her story has been written for her. The gods are watching, Perseus has been sent to fetch her head, and she will do anything not to play into their hands.
 
Content warning: This play alludes to sexual assault and deals with its aftermath. The play does not depict this or directly talk about it.
 
CAST:
Medusa (a former high priestess of Athena, turned Gorgon) – Maggie Rahilly
Stheno (A Gorgon, the eldest of the three sisters) – Ally McKenna
Euryale (A Gorgon, the middle of the three sisters) – Maddie Leitch
Kalliope (A young woman who washes upon Medusa’s island) – Elsa Marian
The Statues – Pat Boll, Evan Dodge, Barb Palasits
 
Within the Shadows
A Comedy-Drama
Written by Scott Shallenbarger
Directed by Evan Lewis
Steven and Sandra, two parts of an exceptionally close trio of college friends, are seeing each other for the first time in years. Sean, Steven’s closest friend and Sandra’s fiancé, has taken his life. Long buried jealousies erupt as the two try to define their friendship with the man who tied them together. This dynamic play explores the destructive consequences of suppressing emotional truth.
 
Content warning: This play deals with themes of suicide.
 
CAST:
Sandra – Sarah Wasserman
Steven – Marty Gnidula
 
Damn the Circumstances
Written by Steven Carl McCasland
Directed by Josh Huffman
In a home that has seen many years of Ruth and her family, Ruth lives alone. Her husband was found dead by her. Now Ruth takes care of the house where she raised her two children: Hadley and Mamie. The house is run-down, and Mamie pays a visit to collect a book from her father’s old room. Not knowing that Ruth would be awake, Mamie is confronted. It’s discovered she was actually there to collect the Norman Rockwell painting her father left behind for the family. Mamie discovers that Hadley, her newly sober brother, is living in the house again with Ruth. Mamie has a problem with this because she claims he can’t be trusted with something as valued in the house due to his substance abuse issues and instability. The heated conversation between the two siblings prompts Ruth to take matters into her own hands.
 
Content warning: Suicide, gunshots, with references to Substance Abuse and Self-Mutilation.
 
CAST:
Hadley – JT McAllister
Mamie – Hannah Cochran
Ruth – Kyra Gillespie
 
After You Get What You Want
Written and Directed by Addison Wales
After You Get What You Want is a comedic take on a performer's inner conflict and struggle with acting and art in the modern world, on top of all the challenges that plague a young generation. It questions the meaning of success in an ever changing and demanding industry. The song After You Get What You Want, You Don't Want It, was written by Irving Berlin and performed by Marilyn Monroe in the film No Business Like Show Business.
 
CAST:
Addison Wales
Lauren Johnston (offstage voice)
 

Program B – presented Saturday, April 23 @ 2:00PM and Sunday, April 24 @ 7:30PM

I <3 My Coven
Written by Jenny Rachel Weiner
Directed by Meg Young
“A play about spirituality and the current trend of co-opting witch culture; about delusion and healing; about groups of women; and about our lord and savior, stevie nicks.”
In this satirical comedy, Amanda’s ex-boyfriend Greg is dead (to her, at least), and it’s up to her friends Grace and Bobby to heal her through the power of witchcraft. But Grace and Bobby’s plans of burning sage and dancing to Stevie Nicks are rocked upon the arrival of Amanda’s new friend Rona, an “actual witch.” The four women explore how to heal and along the way, discover what will unite them.
 
CAST:
Bobby – Rachel Langlois
Grace – Ella Matthews
Amanda – Liz Oliver
Rona – Sophia Mras
Greg – Quentin Pardee Collins
 
Antigo Nick
A translation by Anne Carson
Based on the story by Sophocles
Directed by Maddie Barnes
Antigone, the daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta, has lost her two brothers Eteokles and Polyneikes to war. Creon, becoming King of Thebes after the war, decides to give only Eteokles a proper burial while Polyneikes is seen as a traitor and is forbidden burial by law. Antigone rebels and decides to bury her brother anyways. She is caught, and Creon sentences her to death. The injustice of her death leads to more death, ending in tragedy.
 
Content Warning: References to suicide and death. None of the violence happens onstage but there are graphic references to these events.
 
CAST:
Antigone – Erin Tevnan
Ismene (sister of Antigone) – Evelyn Bart
Kreon (king of Thebes) – Wyatt Adams
Haimon (son of Kreonand Eurydike) – Leggatt Kerek
Eurydike (wife of Kreon, mother of Haimon) – Enzo Boone
Teiresias (blind prophet of Thebes) – Adam Morenberg
Guard – Brendan Griffith
Messenger – Brendan Griffith
Chorus – Enzo Boone
Nick – Livi Lannon
 
Sing to Me Through Open Windows
Written by Arthur Kopit
Directed by Eamon Lynch
A retired magician is paid an annual visit by a young boy. With the help of his clown-garbed butler, the man attempts to recreate the magic of old, only to find he isn’t who he once was.
 
CAST:
Ottoman, the Man – Eden Gostelow
Andrew, the Boy – Owen Kupferer
Loveless, the Clown – Connor Eaton
 
A Bone Close to my Brain
Written by Dan Dietz
Directed by Quentin Collins
What are the limits of brotherly love? And what do they have to do with the 32 bones huddling tight inside your mouth? Through spare dialogue and childlike illustrations, a man describes his relationship with his younger brother -- who is both brilliant and mentally ill -- and the heartbreaking decision he has to make.
 
CAST:
Quentin Collins

Nine
Written by Jane Shepard
Directed by Riley Mulroy
Two women held against their will, and the mind games they play to keep one another alive. Held in a room and chained apart, their only currency is words, and the balance of power is everything when a single word becomes the hanging points between life and death. A harrowing, funny and tender account of the psychological price of survival.
 
Content Warning: This show contains references to violence against women and visible signs of physical and psychological abuse.
 
CAST:
Woman – Tea van Linde
Woman – Ella Kenny

General admission tickets are $10 for each performance and can be purchased online 24/7 HERE. Tickets You can also email theatre@uvm.edu with any questions or for more information.