Drama Fest is on the Way!

The cast of Eurydice rehearsing for the preliminary round of Dramafest. (February 2015)

Peabody High School’s drama club, Stage One, competes in a competition every year called the METG (Massachusetts Education Theatre Guild) Drama Festival. This is a “tournament” between over 100 high schools in the state and each school performs a 40 minute play.

Earlier this year, Stage One displayed a production of Eurydice by Sarah Ruhl and made it through the preliminary round, semi-finals, and finals of Drama Festival. This work of Ruhl’s shows the importance of love and loss, but adds some comical relief to it. The set for Peabody’s production allowed audience members to explore the “underworld” with the characters, which resembles an older subway station. By putting the viewers on an emotional ride and taking them back with an outstanding set, Peabody High won state finals- an amazing feeling that the cast and crew of Eurydice got to experience.

This year, Stage One will be putting on a production of The Long Christmas Ride Home by Paula Vogel- the same playwright who wrote How I Learned to Drive, the play that advanced Peabody to state finals in 2014, but unfortunately didn’t win. Ride Home, another emotional play, shows the effect that adults can have on children. With very minimal set pieces, Peabody will take on a play where the script itself will make the audience feel the mood in the car with the characters and have them imagine the setting. Until February, we will have to wait to see how Stage One will produce their own take of the play.