Training the Young Actors of Theatre Ashbury

“I’d seen Midnight twice before but the performances Simpson gets from his cast – this was the best.”

“Simpson shows genius with his cast of Equus – this was not high school theatre but the kind of performance you would expect at the National Arts Centre.”

“This Streetcar has no weak links – with an original soundtrack played on stage these actors fight and sweat – there is not a weak link in the cast. It’s good gutsy theatre at any level - to watch them is to hurt.”

“Simpson has done it again - I came I watched and I cried - this Crucible rivals the pros.”

Charles Haines Senior Drama Critic CBC Radio All in a Day

Cover photo by D. Sharon Pruitt

The columbinus programme was didactic, like most of our Theatre Ashbury’s programmes. We explained the events leading up to the shooting, as well as an analysis of the possible motives of the killers. We wanted the programme to be kept and referenced as a source of information. It would become a starting point for discussion. Theatre Ashbury won Best Play, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Sound at the Cappies (Critics and Awards Progamme). The kids were thrilled. Their hard work and difficult journey had proved to be successful. They had gone the distance.

We included the poem The Library by Katie in our programme, Trevor’s Monologue by playwright William Mastrosimone, and the poem Tears by Jamie Rowen.

Most of the murder occurred in the library at Columbine High School.

Mastrosimone wrote the first draft of Bang Bang You’re Dead while troubled by a recent event at his son's school, in which an anonymous classmate of his son wrote a message on a chalkboard, threatening to kill his classmates and his teacher.

Every person in this room is dead meat

The Library

By Katie

You try to forget, but you can't,

Its in the library.

Screams being echoed,

Its in the library.

You hear the gun and see the blood,

Its in the library.

Your friend is crying, dying,

Its in the library.

You try to forget, but you cant,

Its in the library.

Inspired by the Thurston High School shooting, BANG BANG YOU'RE DEAD follows a high school murderer who is tormented in his jail cell by apparitions of the classmates he killed.

Trevor’s monologue from the film Bang Bang You’re Dead (2002) by William Mastrosimone

Kids can be the most ruthless people in the world. They can just be supernaturally cruel. Some people don’t even need a gun to hurt you. They use words or laughter. They enjoy watching you bleed to death. They get off watching you fighting back the tears, getting a lump in your throat, blushing, wanting to cry, and they give you a name: trashcan, pizza face, loser, faggot, weirdo, spaz, and retard. You know the name does something to you. It changes who you are, it alters your molecules and one day you wake up and look in the mirror and you

don't recognize yourself anymore, because you believe them.

They win, you lose. You wanna cry, please leave me alone, but nobody listens because nobody cares, because you don’t have a name anymore because they took it away and then one day they say that name and you hear something go snap. You realize what you gotta do, you gotta take back your name and you gotta do it in front of the whole school because that’s where they took your name away from you. You gotta do it so every kid will remember.

This is about justice and after a while you can only think of one way: Jonesboro, Springfield, Paducah, Columbine, a gun, a bomb, instant justice. Ba-Bang! But what a rush when they roll out that yellow tape, miles and miles of yellow tape. They won’t have enough when I’m finished.

So when these hallways are flooded with rivers of blood, when these hallways are choked with their corpses in body bags you all say: oh what a tragedy, oh what a tragedy, but possibly after viewing my tapes, you won't be so quick to judge. Maybe that’s why I was put onto this earth. So consider this my last will and

testament.

Tears

By Jamie Rowen

… One lesson to be learned from this,

the only one for which I’m sure,

is that a gun manufacturer, movie title, music lyric,

parent, anti-depressant, internet, trench coat,

insult, or whatever else,

is not the thing at fault.

And no gun policy, censorship, parent in jail,

drug ban, web-site check, dress code,

suspension, or whatever else,

would have removed their every thought.

We must take looks inside ourselves,

Accepting looks with love.

For what they didn't like in someone else,

is what they saw in themselves.

Theatre Ashbuy’s philosophy was to produce plays of social significance.

columbinus offered the cast and crew opportunities for meaningful discussion and debate. It was hoped that this dialogue would produce new insights and ideas resulting in action for change.

The programme was part of the process.