The Play’s the Thing for Them : Connelly Classes Maintain 140-Year Tradition Among Holy Child Schools

Students at Holy Child private schools throughout the world are keeping alive a tradition of class plays that began in 1851 at St. Leonard’s-on-the-Sea in England.

Cornelia Connelly, the school’s founder, started the plays against the advice of parents and the nuns, who feared that female students might become too worldly under the influence of the theater.

Evidently, greasepaint has posed no such problems over the last 140 years, as members of the four classes at Cornelia Connelly High School in Anaheim--one of 15 Holy Child schools in the United States--recently produced, directed and starred in one-act plays.

After a month’s worth of committee meetings and rehearsals, the plays were presented before an audience of family members, friends and judges in the school’s auditorium.

The freshmen performed Earl Dias’ “Don’t Tell the Folks Back Home,” a play about three young women--a painter, dancer and actress--from the Midwest trying to make it big in New York. The sophomores performed Maya Levy’s “Daughters,” a series of monologues from teen-agers about such modern-day problems as dating, sex and abortions.

The juniors performed Dias’ “Shades of Shakespeare,” while the seniors performed a series of monologues titled “Talking With” by Jane Martin.

The characters in “Talking With” “were crazy and had insecurities that came out in their monologues,” said Katy Schmidt, co-director of the senior play.

Senior Connie Shubash portrayed Scraps, a bored housewife who escapes within herself to an imaginary land of Oz.

As the days of rehearsals turned into weeks, the directors still couldn’t decide on Shubash’s costume. “Connie came in one day with a patchwork dress that she had her aunt make out of an old quilt,” Schmidt said. “It was perfect.”

Junior Marie Alfonso also had costume problems, but her troubles occurred the day of the performance.

“I lost my costume,” she said. “Somebody moved it from a shower stall to another one where I couldn’t see it. It was for the ball scene, and I could just imagine going on stage in shorts.”

The junior class’ main obstacle was creating a backdrop, while the seniors had prop problems--specifically, finding a gurney for Tammy Senese, who delivered her monologue from the perspective of a woman giving birth.

After the plays, three judges--all with professional theater experience--met over lunch to determine the winners.

The sophomores walked away with the bulk of trophies, receiving awards for best play, best director, best sets and best technical effects.

The freshmen won for best program design and choice of plays, the juniors for best costumes and the seniors for best T-shirt design.

Sophomore Tricia Chowning was named the best overall actress.

Chowning “had to put herself into a difficult situation where she had to emulate the pitiful life of a girl whose mother blamed everything on her,” said Mavette Maton, co-director of the play.

Other individual acting awards went to freshmen Natalia Braun and Christina Di Loreto, sophomores Molly Robinson and Suzanne Shepard, juniors Alex Luboviski and Eileen Rana and seniors Denise Ching and Rita Mercado.

Despite initial disappointment over the judges’ decisions, members of the senior class said they were proud of their efforts.

“It was fun and exciting, because it was our last year, and we wanted to prove a point,” actress Shalana Larkins said: that they have enough class togetherness to win.

“I think the judges were way too critical,” she said.

Amy Luskey-Barth, tri-school theater director for Connelly, Servite and Rosary high schools, defended the judges, saying: “One of the things that you learn in drama and English classes is that constructive criticism is not a personal attack.

“The judges are brought in to judge. They take it seriously. . . . It would be simple to have a less analytical look at the work.”

“I was happy with this year’s plays,” Maton said. “They turned out really well. We thank the judges this year (for their comments), because we learned a lot from last year’s comments.”

Though not a winner, Schmidt said she was satisfied with her cast’s performance.

Jenny Correa, the other co-director, “and I put our hearts into the show,” she said. “For one month, we lived class plays. When people let me know how good the play was, it made me realize that all the time spent was worth it.

“Ten years from now, we won’t remember that we didn’t win technical (effects) or costumes,” she said. “We’ll just remember that people liked our play.”