In the auditorium of Washington-Lee High School, theater teacher Scott Sophos coaches his student performers for an upcoming production of Shakespeare’s "Much Ado About Nothing." He runs his students through a lesson on stagecraft, techniques such as making eye contact with the audience during monologues, remaining in character and projecting their voices.
Many of the actors are freshman or sophomores and, for some, the show is their first venture onto the stage. For others, most of them seniors, it marks their last performance.
The show is a milestone for everyone at Washington-Lee no matter what grade. "Much Ado About Nothing" is the last faculty-directed production to be performed in the auditorium before it is torn down next year.
“Over the years, we’ve learned every nook and cranny in this place,” said Neil Rickard, a senior who has been involved in the theater program in one way or another since his freshman year. “It was so easy for us to be creative here. It’s a shame that it’s not going to be here anymore. I‘d like to be able to come back to it one day.”
ARLINGTONIANS APPROVED a bond on the election ballot giving Washington-Lee the funds to build a new school and, along with it, a new auditorium.
A student-led production in the spring of 2005 will be the last show on the old theater's high, recessed wooden stage. The audience next spring will be the last to sit in its 500, 1970’s-era orange seats. The theater once held 1,000 of these marmalade colored chairs before it was renovated and halved in size nearly a decade ago.
“Most people think of the Kennedy Center or Carnegie Hall when they think of a theater,” said Lauren Rayner, a senior who hopes to study acting next year at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. “But anytime I think of one from now on, I will always imagine rows of tacky, bright orange chairs from the 70’s and it’ll be a little sad.”
THE THEATER IS ALMOST 30 years old, yet it is the newest part of Washington-Lee’s current building. It is also the first part of the structure, according to Sophos, that will get the wrecking ball.
Student productions will be moved to the school’s “little theater” while the new one is being built. This poses a challenge to Sophos, who is uncertain how well performances can be organized in a significantly smaller space. He has already contacted H.B. Woodlawn High School with the idea of using their theater for large shows and musicals.
“They are building us a beautiful new theater,” said Sophos. “I’ve seen the design and it is going to be great for our kids, but in the meantime, we’re going to have to make due with something that’s slightly less than what the school’s had in the past.”
Many of the props, sets, costumes and other bits of theater equipment will be lost when the theater is destroyed. Much of it is destined to remain in storage until the new theater is finished, but not all of it.
“We’re going to have to selectively choose what we take with us because there won’t be enough room in storage for all of it,” said Sophos. “We’re going to be displaced for two or three years.”
THE SADDEST LOSS, according to many students, will be the loss of history the old theater has for the student body, a history literally written on its walls.
The cast and crew of each production has always left some reminder of their work. The walls at each wing are tattooed with the names of shows dating back to the 1980’s. The prop room backstage is decorated with a colorful mural featuring almost psychedelic illustrations. A column in the same room bears a painted list of rules for the gopher or “go-for,” the crew member assigned to handle a myriad of small tasks that help keep the show running smoothly. All of these decorations will be lost in the demolition.
“We’ve spent so much of our lives here,” said senior Mia Smith. “I was always able to feel comfortable in this theater. I’ll be sad to see it go.”
Rickard remembers staying so late after school on several occasions to paint and construct sets that custodians had to compel him and other students to go home. Rayner recalls countless inside jokes, some too embarrassing to share, others she said, “You just had to be there for them” like the memory of one student who had a habit of whimsically tossing his cast-mates into trash cans to get a laugh.
Smith recalled staying late to help paint the theater’s stage in a checkerboard pattern for a production of “The Tempest,” something students won’t be able to do, according to Sophos, in the new theater.
“We’ve all just had so many experiences here,” said Blake Maloof, a junior. “There’s a real community that has formed around it. Most of that is the people who performed here, but a big part of it is the theater itself because it’s all attached to it in some way.”
“It’s gotten to the point that I don’t think I know what I would have done in high school without the theater program,” said Rickard. “It’s something that we’re going to miss.”