Drama Shows Teens They Aren’t Alone

Jerry’s got the hots for Angela de Carlo. Andrea’s busy ripping her ex-boyfriend’s picture into a million pieces. Millie’s drowning out her sorrow with a swig of vodka. Roger wants to escort Mary to the prom.

And so go the days of their lives.

At the Moorpark High School performing arts center on Tuesday, a group of students slipped into stage personas from “Voices From the High School,” a play that delves into the gamut of teen emotions, from ecstatic love to depression and loneliness.

“It gives you an idea of what life is like in high school,” said 13-year-old Matt Taylor, who played Bo, a character whose sister dies of carbon monoxide poisoning. “You have the sadness, the fun and the dumping of girlfriends.”

The Moorpark Unified School District and the youth agency Project Pride, or Parks and Recreation Inspire Dignity and Esteem, focused the summer on teaching students--some with poor grades and frequent absences--how to act.

Most of the junior high and high school students with no previous school theater experience, spent the last seven weeks rehearsing every weekday for the play, which will be shown to the public free at the high school’s performing art center Thursday and Friday at 7 p.m.

Mesa Verde Middle School teacher Nema Mirabile spent weeks preparing her students for the two performances. She hopes the play will allow students to see that the feelings they experience are universally shared by teens.

“The tumultuous times of teenage years are experienced by not just them, but their peers, and all the adults have been there too,” Mirabile said in between directing students to project their voices, stay quiet and stand under the stage lights. “It’s not something you easily forget.”

Most are familiar with the characters portrayed in the play, which strings together a series of dialogues: the nosy jealous classmate who interrogates others about personal affairs; the student so in love that she still reels from the memory of accidentally bumping into the arms of a boy; or the student who drowns herself in alcohol to stem her sense of loneliness.

During the past week, the teens ironed out problems, learning to project their voices out into the audience, taking the right position on the stage, cutting down the backstage chatter.

For at least one student, the whole summer has been more than worthwhile.

After playing his part, 15-year-old Jose Paz said he realized that many of his own past experiences were being acted out on the stage. It took the rub out of a common teenage notion--the feeling that he, and he alone, had gone through a difficult time.

“I feel like I’m not alone in this world,” said Paz, standing in the quiet and darkness of the backstage area.