Every other spring since the 1990’s, Tabor Academy has exchanged a drama production with Ellesmere College, a private high school in Ellesmere, England. This year, Tabor will send a group on the exchange again, bringing one of our fall productions, titled The Laramie Project.
In 1998, a twenty-one year old Laramie, WY, boy was taken from a bar, driven to the outskirts of the town, and tied to a fence, where he was beaten to death by two similarly aged Laramie boys. In the following years, the members of the Tectonic Theater Project travelled to Wyoming many times to interview the residents of the town about how they were affected by the crime, and used these interviews to construct the play, The Laramie Project, that has now been performed worldwide. The play explores various aspects of the crime, such as the possibility of homophobia, hatred, or sexual advance being motivation for the cruel acts. However, most of all, it explores the emotional changes that such a small town had to go through after such a large, and soon defining, event.
After performing Laramie in the black box at Tabor this fall, the actors will pick it back up again in the spring right before our trip over Spring Break to the United Kingdom and Ireland, where they will perform at various locations around Dublin, Ireland and Ellesmere, England. In April, Ellesmere College will send a production to Tabor, where they will perform for our school and be hosted by our drama students.
Putting on the show itself has been an extremely emotional and maturing experience for the whole cast and crew. Exploring an issue such as homosexuality and homophobia is an extremely relevant issue in our world, and especially in our country, right now. The Laramie Project has opened dozens of conversations within the cast about how they feel about what the characters say, and about the slightly uncomfortable nature of the script, and it will hopefully do the same for those who watch it.
That, ultimately, is the goal of the play: to leave those witnessing it in thought about the issues that it puts forth. The cast and crew are very excited to put on The Laramie Project this fall, and especially this spring, abroad! The Laramie Project is a sad, happy, emotional, serious, and most of all, important show, and we hope to leave all who come thinking a bit more about Matthew Shepard and his town, and the very real issues of homophobia in our society.
Don't miss The Laramie Project in the Blackbox Theater, Thursday, Friday and Saturday November 10-12 at 7:30 p.m.!
