June 16, 2006

June 19, 2006

The bracelets arrived this morning.  Thanks! The kids will love them. I'll hand them out tomorrow night and try to get a picture with them on. (the notepad is hilarious--I'm keeping that) 

Here is a photo of local screenwriter, Thom Southerland, (who is also a library employee) working with the kids to develop the sequence of the acts.  Some of the students have a real interest in writing.  Thom and another volunteer are going to be working with them to adapt the book.  Some of the students are interested in set design, and several, of course are aspiring actors.  Thom is also making a video documentation of the entire project-- interviewing the kids, etc.

I'll be out of town later this week, but will send you some updates when I return.

Kelli Dean

July 14, 2006

The play was cast early last week.  It is my understanding that one of our students who will also be playing the role of the fathers, did a great deal of the writing.  I am going to forward you a copy of their script (it's almost the final version).  The kids are going to be doing a lot of rehearsals over the next couple of weeks.  Some of the sets are going to be created using digital photography projections, (photos taken by the kids).

Kelli

(WEBPERSON'S NOTE:  Kelli and the cast and crew also invited Crutcher to attend a performance of the play the first weekend in August.  A schedule conflict may make that impossible, but we haven't given up just yet.)

August 2, 2006

Things are coming along well.  The kids have all learned their lines.  We have been doing lighting and sound cue type things for the past couple of nights.  Final dress rehearsal will be Thursday 8/3-- probably around 7:00 our time. 

We've been videotaping along the way, I must admit, I've been slacking on the still photos lately, so I don't have any to send today.  I'll be sending you guys copies of the program, a DVD of the play and a couple of t-shirts.

Of note:  We did have to make a couple of changes.  Nobody could say Warren Peece with a straight face, so the kids changed the name of the title in the book to Fighting Chance.  Billy's character is a girl:  Billie.  The kids also changed Chris' character in the book to Chris Thomas-- since they change the title, they figured they should change the author too.

The program is going to include a "thank you" to Chris for his permission to use The Sledding Hill, for writing banned books, and for encouraging us to read them.

Kelli

August 8, 2006

We had two shows this weekend.  We are estimating that over 200 people attended.  A great time was had by all!  Mr. Crutcher's book received several compliments with regard to its subjects and their relativity to teens.

There was an artice in the Lexington Herald Leader this past Sunday 6/6  I've inserted the text. 

The DVD/documentary should be finished in a couple of weeks.  Can you please give me an address where I can send a couple to you.

Thanks!

Kelli Dean

August 6, 2006

High school thespians spend summer at play

By Rich Copley

HERALD-LEADER CULTURE COLUMNIST

When some Lexington high school thespians are asked how they spent their summer vacations, they'll be able to answer with tales of writing plays, working with published authors and performing on international stages.

As you read this, a contingent of Paul Laurence Dunbar High School students and two from the School for Creative and Performing Arts at Lafayette are in Scotland, where they are presenting the play Our Time at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Closer to home, kids in the Page to Stage program, presented by the Lexington Public Library and Actors Guild of Lexington, just wrapped up their adaptation of Chris Crutcher's novel The Sledding Hill.

And we mean their adaptation.

Page to Stage began as a conversation between Kelli Dean, program coordinator for the library, and Richard St. Peter, artistic director at Actors Guild, about getting more teenagers into theater and the library. They came up with the idea of the library picking a book for the students to adapt into a play. Then they started gathering an ensemble through a variety of methods, from old-fashioned flyers to teens networking through MySpace.com.

"I was flipping channels and saw it on Channel 13," Lafayette High School student Madeline Carey says, referring to the Lexington-Fayette Public Schools cable channel. "I said, I'm a drama nerd. I've got to do this."

The program attracted avowed theater geeks as well as kids just interested in giving the stage a try. There were no auditions, so no one was turned away. But the group was whittled from 28 students at the beginning to the 16 who took the stage and worked behind the scenes Friday and Saturday night to present the show.

Among the interesting adventures in creating the show was seeing how a novel gets adapted into a play. The students ended up making quite a few decisions about what to keep and what to leave out from the book, and even the tone. Crutcher's novel, involving a preacher who wants to ban a book from a high school, portrayed the minister as sinister, but the playwrights, led by experienced screenwriter Thom Southerland, took a more moderate approach.

"There are no bad guys," says Lexington Catholic High School student Glenn Bush, 15. "Everyone is doing what they think is right."

Jacob Sexton, 17, a Lafayette student, says director Julianne Pogue explained it this way: "No one wakes up thinking, 'I'm going to go kick dogs today.'"

The Dunbar students got to work with a new script in Our Time, Bo List's Our Town-like play that winds up with a school shooting. Dunbar drama director Trish Clark says that the last time the Dunbar crew went to Scotland, they took a musical. This time, they wanted to tackle something edgier, addressing issues the kids had on their minds.

For this journey, Clark brought along two students from SCAPA with whom she had worked as director of the Lexington Shakespeare Institute, a part of the Lexington Shakespeare Festival.

Bringing student actors together, she says, is important to creating a new generation in Lexington theater. And Page to Stage, its directors say, also is important in drawing teens in and showing them how theater works from all angles, even if they go on to other careers.

"Drama camps can cost $600, and look how much we got to do here for free," says Elizabeth Greenfield, 16, a student at Tates Creek High School.

Whether the students travel abroad or put on a play at home, these intensive summer theater programs are valuable for teens, Clark says.

"It's just fun," she says. "And it's an experience they will carry with them a lifetime."

The Sledding Hill by Chris Crutcher

Stage Adaptation by Eric Schlich

Script Structure

ACT I

SCENE I

1. Dead body. (Billy)

2. Eddie finds body.

3. Billy speaks...staying for Eddie.

4. Eddie- background: (IQ Test, ADD, Dog Collar, Sunday School -> Tarter)              

5. Sheriff (Was Billy still alive when you found him?)

SCENE II

6. Eddie freaks (two voices) / 1^st bump (Sledding Hill)

SCENE III (SPLIT: House/School)

7. Dinner Scene- Tarter, Mom, Eddie

8. 1^st day of school- RML, Ms. Lloyd, Warren Peece, Dan AND Montana

9. Dinner #2- Overt for Tarter

10. School- classroom (Kids LOVE the book)

11. Principal’s office (Mr. West, Ms. Lloyd)

12. Classroom- Eddie keeps book. (Montana: my Dad?)

ACT II

SCENE I (SPLIT: School/Church)

1. Furnace/boiler room secret reading (Eddie/Billy’s Dad) Montana

    Red Brickers (Maxwell West/Tarter)

2. YFC Meeting- Chad (gay) and Dan

3. Ms. Lloyd/Principal

    Eddie returns book (on her side)

4. Eddie speaks to Tarter (baptism)

SCENE II

5. Bump- Billy/Eddie- Freedom, Good Guys/Bad Guys (Tarter’s past)

SCENE III

6. Testimony

7. Coffee Shop?

8. SCHOOL BOARD MEETING -> Climax

9. Book Banned

10. Monologues?

11. Billy’s Exit

The Sledding Hill by Chris Crutcher

Eric Schlich

Characters

Billy Bartholomew-

Eddie Proffit-

Reverend Tarter-

Mr. Bartholomew-

Ms. Lloyd-

Mrs. Proffit-

Montana West-

Danielle Turner-

Chad Nash-

Maxwell West-

Mrs. Madison-

Sheriff-

Groups

Red Brickers- (3) Tarter, Mrs. Madison, Sheriff

YFC Members- (3) Danielle, Chad, Eddie

Ms. Lloyd’s class- (4) Montana, Danielle, Chad, Eddie

School Board- (3) Tarter, Mrs. Madison, Sheriff

The Sledding Hill by Chris Crutcher

Eric Schlich

Act I: Scene I

Billy enters, stares down at body beneath sheetrock.

Billy: Hey, I’m Billy Bartholomew. I mean, I was Billy Bartholomew. I’m dead now, (indicating body) as you can see.

The good news is: there’s no pain. After I kicked over that pile of Sheetrock in Bear Creek High’s gym I looked to a spot beside me and suddenly I’m at that spot looking back at a seriously expired Billy Bartholomew. 

You see, when you first die, you don’t know you’re dead. You know something’s way different, but you’ve been playing the Earthgame with such intensity, it’s hard to realize you’ve just stepped out of it.

But, the longer you’re dead the clearer you become what the deal is: that your Earth life, which seemed to last a long fourteen years, wasn’t even a subatomic blip in eternal time. You laugh at all the crazy considerations you had while playing the Earthgame because you were so focused on the things you thought were important.

Once you’re dead again- which is like being truly alive- you can haul yourself around eternity at soul-boggling speeds. Earth scientists consider the speed of light to be the ultimate speed. We travel at the speed of imagination.

Death’s definitely the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

Eddie runs in.

That’s Eddie, my best friend. It figures he’d be the one to find my body.

Eddie frantically attempts to free Billy’s body from the Sheetrock. Billy stops, turns, watches, shakes his head.

I could take off right now. But it looks like Eddie just went into a dark room in his Earthgame- two loved ones dead in one month, his dad and his best friend, and he found them both.

Let it never be said that Eddie Proffit doesn’t know what to do when he finds a dead body. He bikes straight out to Bear Creek’s Sledding Hill, the one we always go down on in the winter, lays on his back, looks up at the clouds, and tries to make what he’s just seen into a fantasy.

Eddie runs out.

I think I’ll hang around a second, universe time, and help Eddie out.

In case you think that’s some big sacrifice, you should know that I can hang around and at the same time whip back and forth rediscovering the knowledge of eternity, which I left at the doorstep when I entered Earth. You did, too. So did Eddie.

 But the unique thing about Eddie is: he’s the only person I know who has gut-level knowledge of how life on Earth is connected to life in the universe.

Let me tell you about my friend, Eddie Proffit.

Lights dim. Stage is cleared. Single light keeps focus on Billy. Eddie enters behind him.

Most kids think Eddie Proffit’s stupid because he asks questions no one else thinks of. His mind bounces from one thing to the other pretty much however it wants and long before he’s finishing up one thought, he’s on the something else.

I was Billy Bartholomew, smartest kid in school, which was supposed to be a minor miracle because my father’s the school janitor.

Mr. Bartholomew comes on stage sweeping, passing by. Pays no attention to Billy. Greets Eddie.

So why was I hanging out with a kid with an IQ short of triple digits? Truth is, Eddie’s IQ was off the charts. When Eddie scored a 65 on the test, my dad asked him what happened. You know what he said?

Eddie: Well, Mr. Bartholomew, I was answering the questions and when I saw what a neat pattern I was making filling in those little ovals, I began to make neater and neater patterns!

Mr. Bartholomew: You weren’t reading the questions?

Eddie: I wasn’t even keeping it to one answer per row. Did you see my answer sheet? It looks really cool.

Billy: So my dad talked to the principal, Mrs. Madison, who was about to put Eddie in special ed classes.

Mrs. Madison enters.

Mr. Bartholomew: The kid scored a 65 without even reading the questions!

Mrs. Madison: I really don’t think Eddie would score any higher if he retook the test.

Mr. Bartholomew: I know he would.

Mrs. Madison: I’m sorry, there’s nothing I can do.

Mr. Bartholomew helps Eddie with the test.

Billy: Dad couldn’t be stopped so easily. He had a key to every file drawer in the school. So he helped Eddie retake the test, five questions at a time. After Eddie added a hundred points to his score, he didn’t take any special ed classes.

Mr. Bartholomew and Mrs. Madison exit.

But because Eddie asked strange questions when teachers said something he thought couldn’t be true, he was still considered a pain in the neck.

Rev. Tarter enters.

That’s Reverend Tarter. Eddie and I have been anticipating Tarter in our lives for some time. Under normal circumstances a sinner could avoid him by simply staying away from church, but he’s also one of Bear Creek High’s English teachers: impossible to get away from. Sunday school is where Eddie first ran afoul of Tarter.

Tarter: Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of the ‘great fish,’ the whale, and...

Eddie: What kind of protective rain gear did Jonah have?

Tarter: Clears his throat. Excuse me?

Eddie: My dad told me the digestive juices in a human stomach are strong enough to dissolve a jawbreaker like a cube of sugar in hot water. A whale’s gotta have at least as strong digestive juices as us, right? And if Jonah’s in there wearing his regular Bible clothes, it seems like they’d get seriously eaten up.

Tarter: No, Eddie. God was taking care of Jonah.

Eddie: I know. You already said that. So did he give him a special suit? Or did he just make the whale’s stomach acids not work? That’s no fair to the whale. I mean, even if he’s gonna spit Jonah up whole, there has to be a bunch of other stuff down there he needs to digest. I mean, whales suck everything in, did you know...

Tarter: EDDIE! Being a true Christian is about having faith. It is disrespectful to question lessons from the Bible. What you hear in this room is true. I want you to remember that.

Billy: I hated it when Eddie got in trouble. So we pooled out money and bought one of those electric dog collars you use to keep the dog from peeing in the house. As he speaks he walks over and snaps dog collar to Eddie’s ankle.  It sort of worked. The idea was solid in theory, problematic in execution.

Tarter: Then Moses parted the Red Sea to lead his people out of Egypt away from the Pharaoh’s...

Eddie: Wait. What about the sea life at the bottom? I could see how the fish could just swim off to the side and stay where the water is, but what about crustaceans at the bottom? Wouldn’t they have dried up or drown in the air?

Tarter: Eddie, God takes care of all his creatures.

Eddie: Yeah, I know and I won’t even count the chipmunk my mom killed in the car on the way to school Friday...

Tarter: Eddie...

Eddie: But did he move them over so they could be under the water or did he just make it okay for them to be dry?

Tarter: EDDIE...Anger and frustration rises.

Eddie: Because the way I see it...

Billy: Sorry Eddie. Pulls out remote control, pushes button as Eddie speaks.

Eddie: All the Israel guys would be stepping on them, but...

EEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!

Screams from electric shock.

Tarter: EDDIE!!!

Eddie: Breathing heavily. It’d give Moses’s people a lot better traction.

Tarter: ENOUGH.

Grabs Eddie by the wrist, stands him up, and spreads his arms out like a crucifix, then leans him against wall as if in a chair.

Tarter: Did your father put you up to this?

Eddie: Up to what?

Tarter: All these foolish questions.

Eddie: I thought you said there was no such thing as a foolish question.

Tarter: He is putting you up to this.

As Eddie shakes his head no, he falls on his butt. Mr. Proffit enters w/ truck tire and wrench. Eddie runs off, watches from afar.

Billy: John Proffit and Sanford Tarter were exact opposites. They always resented each other. Mr. Proffit was a believer only in what he could see and touch. He ran the last all service gas station in Bear Creek, Idaho. Mr. Proffit and Reverend Tarter were always arguing down there.

Tarter: Now, Mr. Proffit, you really should attend service with your wife more.

Mr. Proffit: Listen, here Tarter. I don’t need more religion from you! I get enough of it from my wife. Now, unless you need a tire fixed or to fuel up, I suggest you get out.

Tarter: Mr. Proffit, surely you want your son to grow up with the proper morals and values.

Mr. Proffit: I figure he’s got enough sense in him to learn as he goes. Eddie’s a smart kid. And I’ll be here to help him out when the time comes. I’m his father, Tarter. Me. I’d hate for you cross the line in my house!

Tarter: Yes, but you see...I’m not sure if you’re...if you have...if...

Mr. Proffit: OUT!

Tarter leaves. Eddie runs through. Mr. Proffit grabs his arm.

Mr. Proffit: Careful there, son.

Eddie: Dad, Billy and I are going to hike out to Sledding Hill! Wanna come?

Mr. Proffit: Sorry, son, I gotta finish these tires.

Eddie: Approaching tire. It’ll go a lot faster if I help out!

Mr. Proffit: EDDIE! How many times have I told you how dangerous the lock ring on a tire is? If it isn’t locked, it might as well be a bomb! It’ll take your head right off your body. Now step back.

Eddie: Jeez, Dad. I wasn’t going to do anything.

Mr. Proffit: I’m sorry, buddy, I just don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you.

Eddie: OK, but you don’t have to tell me the same thing eight jillion times.

Mr. Proffit: Sorry, kiddo. Go catch up with Billy. Have fun.

Eddie heads off stage. Mr. Proffit goes back to work on the tire. Lights suddenly go out. Loud boom echoes. Lights come back on to reveal Mr. Proffit dead on stage.

Eddie: Dad? Runs off after seeing body.

Mrs. Proffit passes with Reverend Tarter consoling her.

Billy: Things got worse from there. After Eddie’s Dad died, his mom’s brain got kidnapped by Tarter and the Red Brick Church. She went on and on about God’s plan. Well, Eddie figured if God’s Plan included his dad taking a bite out of an exploding lock ring, then God can plant a big one on Eddie’s keister. Today he was up at the Sledding Hill having some words with God.

Eddie enters on Sledding Hill. Yells upward.

Eddie: What gives you the right to choose who stays and who goes on this stupid planet? Why do you have the power to decide, anyway? I hate you for this! I hate you for taking him away from me! It’s not fair. It’s not right. I won’t ever let you do it again!

Storms across stage.

Billy: About an hour later he found my body in the school gym. Turning it into a fantasy didn’t work so well this time.

The sheriff enters and runs to meet Eddie.

Sheriff: Eddie?

Eddie looks up, tears in his eyes.

Sheriff: Eddie, you found Billy, right? Under the Sheetrock?

Eddie nods.

Sheriff: Did you try to pull him out?

Eddie nods.

Sheriff: Eddie, I need you to listen carefully. Places hand on Eddie’s shoulder. Was he still alive when you were trying to pull him out?

Eddie’s eyes widen. He falls to the ground in tears.

Billy: I have a feeling it will be awhile before anyone hears another word from Eddie Proffit.

TO READ THE REST OF THE SCRIPT, CLICK HERE.