What: "West End Blues"
When: April 14-18, 7:30 p.m. and 18-19, 2:30 p.m.
Where: Cave Studio Theatre
Cost: $6
In the final Cave show of the season, Ball State students present an original play written by one of their own.
Every year, the Cave Studio Series ends with the Festival of New Plays, in which one or more student scripts are presented. This year, senior theatrical studies major Justin Pierce’s play, “West End Blues,” was selected for this program.
Director Brittany Lodge, a junior theatre productions and telecommunications video production double major, selected this full-length production out of several 10-minute, one-act and full-length scripts which were submitted for consideration.
This script follows four individuals “who learn to understand how strong you must be in order to leave everything you know behind, including your loved ones,” said Lodge.
Two of these people are Charlie Weston and Leanne King. Weston, played by freshman theatrical studies major Silas Green, is a senior in college whose difficult life circumstances have left him feeling alone and abandoned by his family.
“Charlie’s biggest challenge has to be, frankly, himself because it’s hard for him to find a healthy way to cope with things,” said Green.
Leanne is a girl with a troubled past who is working to turn her life around and discover who she is so she can maintain a healthy relationship with another person, said freshman musical theatre major Courtney Martin, who plays her in the production.
“She doesn’t know what security is and she doesn’t know what family is,” said Martin. “To know what feeling loved is and to feel belonging is hard for her, so she struggles with finding herself as an individual and what that means for the people around her.”
In order to convey the themes of abandonment the script emphasizes, Lodge worked to incorporate it into every aspect of the show, from the plot and the characters to the set and the props.
“The set is mixed and matched, like someone could literally pack up and leave at any moment,” she said. “That’s what the whole play is about—learning about when people need to move on to a new chapter in their lives.”
One of the struggles for the play’s young actors has been to place themselves into the characters of people who have dealt with issues that they might have never experienced. Both Green and Martin said they wished to respect and own the experiences of their characters’ decisions and circumstances as honestly as possible.
“A lot of what [Leanne] has gone through is hard, and to do justice to the character and the people who have actually been through this in real life is hard,” said Martin.
Unlike typical productions, the Festival of New Plays gives the director an opportunity to work directly with the playwright, and the playwright gets to workshop their script throughout the production process to create a refined final product for their audience.
For this production, Lodge, Pierce and other production crew members met once a week for a month and a half in order to workshop the script to get it ready to produce, a process which continued until just before opening night.
“Even a week ago, we were making cuts,” said Lodge. “We didn’t have a final script until yesterday [the Sunday before opening night].”
Lodge said everyone involved has treated “West End Blues” professionally and worked as hard as she would expect them to for a larger show.
“Everyone has taken the time to work as hard as they did for a Cave show that doesn’t usually get as much attention as a main stage show,” she said. “Everyone put so much into it and was so professional. I couldn’t ask for a better cast and crew.”
Lodge said she hopes audience members will walk away from the performance with a greater appreciation for others and their individual circumstances.
“Everything that we as human beings do in life is not so black and white,” she said. “We need to take the time in life to stop and understand why people do what they do.”
By taking the time to understand those around them, the characters in the show demonstrate how people can truly learn from others.
“Let yourself learn from other people,” said Green about the main message of the show. “Other people can change things within you and, whether it be good or bad, you will always take wisdom and life lessons from it.”
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