May 8, 2008
BY COURTNEY CRAIN
Assistant Editor
When the lights lift, the scene is a prison cell with the spotlight on a lone teenager.
“So you make your face a mask. A mask that hides your face. A face that hides the pain. A pain that eats your heart. A heart nobody knows.”
“What is this?”
“Why me?”
“Why not you? Everybody’s gotta die sometime. Might as well get it over with.”
He hears the voices of the dead. The audience soon learns that earlier that day, he had taken a rifle to school and killed five of his peers, some he knew and some he did not.
On May 7 at 7:30 p.m. in the Robert Brown Theatre, the acting class will present their final assignment of the year, a drama entitled Bang, Bang You’re Dead.
Throughout the story, his victims want to know why he killed them. The play seeks to shine light on the pain that has been caused across the nation due to school shootings.
Director of Theatre and Theatrical Services Scott MacLaughlin teaches the class and is directing the play.
The cast is made up of every student enrolled in the theater class.
“We have a diverse class with students from all backgrounds,” MacLaughlin said. “There are students in the class who want to major in theatre and go on to work professionally, and we have many others that are taking the class just for fun.”
MacLaughlin said he decided to try a different genre than recent plays.
“Unlike many of the comedies we have produced, this show has a definite message,” MacLaughlin said. “It deals with some very powerful themes like bullying, hatred, and more importantly, school shootings.”
William Mastrosimone wrote Bang, Bang You’re Dead in 1998 in response to the tragic school shootings. According to MacLaughlin, there have been approximately 38 school shootings since 1996 in the United States.
The cast has been practicing for approximately five weeks during their Monday, Wednesday and Friday class periods; less than three hours a week.
“It [Bang, Bang You’re Dead] could cause someone to really commit to helping stop violence in school,” cast member Jarrod Alley said. “Because we all know what high school was like. For some of us it was great, but for the rest it was just a trip to hell.”
“I think the play help people take school shootings more seriously, but it really depends on how serious the audience takes it,” cast member Sabrina McKinney said. “I really hope they don’t dismiss it as a high school thing, especially after Virginia Tech.”
The Cowley Press is produced by the Newspaper Production students. The primary goal of The Cowley Press is to serve the college community in a fair and accurate manner. Editorials, columns,and letters reflect the opinions of the writers. The staff reserves the right to edit letters for taste and length. Letters must be signed by the author.
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