This year at NPHS we presented Moon over Buffalo, an irreverent backstage comedy romp by Ken Ludwig. It was an exciting piece for all involved. For me and fellow seniors Eric Roper and Rijul Siddhartha it would be our last fall play at NPHS and a bittersweet opportunity to grab some laughs up on that friendly and familiar old stage. We joined forces with a trio of talented junior ladies: Jackie Eisenberg, MaryKate Grimes, and Sarah Clowes-Walker.   A sophomore, Michael Kelleher shared his talents with us from Magnet School, and rounding out our troupe was our rising freshman Caroline Schlobohm. Together we made up one crazy theatre company playing an equally eccentric theatre company, go figure.

It would have been a pretty routine endeavor without Hurricane Sandy having slapped herself in the middle of it like an uninvited houseguest. We certainly lost considerable time during those powerless days. Time is more than a commodity in theatre. It’s used for rehearsals, tech work, fittings, running, re-running, and for every other task crucial to the production of a play. So it is easy to say we were all a little scared as we returned from our impromptu break, feeling not quite ready for the rapidly approaching opening night. Our final rehearsals hurtled by and we managed to tie up all the loose ends into a presentable product.

I’m sure none of us will forget our final rehearsal before the opening though. Our director, Mr. Duke, had us perform the play (yes, all of it) in a lightning round. The result was a parade of screeching actors with flailing arms racing through the text as if they were on fast-forward. Crazy as it sounds it helped us to find the timing and excited pace of the show, and ended up landing us confidently in an exhilarating opening night. We had pulled off a speed round, putting up a production with very tight timing (in more ways than one).

While I would never wish any hurricanes to ravage theatre companies mid rehearsal period, it definitely served to teach us that when it comes to comedy, timing is everything!