When Fallon Thigpen, who plays the main character in Mockingbird, walks onto the stage, she is filled with anticipation.
“I’m excited to see the play come together after we worked months on it,” she said, “to see it work out so smooth.”
The freshman faced a challenging role, playing an autistic 11-year-old named Caitlin who is antisocial, but works to overcome that burden while dealing with the death of her brother.
“The biggest challenge was a lot of the long paragraphs I had to get in order to make sure the sound crew knew when to do lighting, so that was probably the most difficult thing,” she said.
“I’m kind of nervous, but on the other hand this being my first performance I’m kind of excited and I’m honored.”
The play opens tonight with additional performances at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday in the Freshman Lecture Hall.
Mr. Tom Mackey, director of the play, believes Mockingbird can be relatable for many people.
“It is based on a novel by Kathryn Erskine, and the novel is intended for children,” he said, “but I find that much of what is talked about is really important for parents and teenagers to really understand because of the topics that it deals with. It really helps open up a world of understanding to these different social issues.”
Mockingbird explores social issues such as neurodiversity, mental and emotional health and the present threat of gun violence in schools. Also the importance of family and community when dealing with trauma.
Senior Irmani Ward plays Kaitlyn’s father who struggles to overcome his loss and help his daughter.
“One of the things – as an actor – is to think about all the things that impact your role,” he said. “So I think about how the dad is feeling, because he also lost a son and a [wife], so he’s going through a lot. I usually do deep breath work to really get into character so I can display all the emotion a character is feeling.”
Playing such an emotional character can be difficult.
“It’s not completely natural,” Ward said, “because you’re acting an emotion instead of being that emotion. You display things an angry person would do and ask ‘What’s their body language?’, ‘How would they react?’, ‘How would they talk?’ ‘Why are they angry?’ A very good thing to ask is ‘Why is this character feeling this emotion?’ so you can feel that emotion, too.”
Senior Samaya Jackson plays a school counselor who forms a bond with Caitlin.
“That was the only role I auditioned for,” she said. “I helped out other people by going into the audition room with them to help them read lines for their audition, but my main focus was Mrs. Brook. As I read the script, her role just caught my attention.”
Part of her preparation includes doing vocal and physical warmups with the cast before performances and to reflect on her specific part.
“I get into the mindset of the character, and remind myself about the circumstances of the scene, as well as the overall show. Then, I just wait to put it all to practice,” she said.
Many of the students play more than one role. For instance, Senior Khalil Harris played both a mourner at the funeral and a 5th-grader, as well as understudying the part of the father.
“The play has a lot of things that happen in the real world that you may go through,” he said. “It’s very important. Many people may think it’s sad, but it’s very funny at times.”
This year’s play is being held in the Freshman Lecture Hall because of construction in the auditorium. The crew worked hard to transform the space, aided by Mr. Mackey who has experience working with smaller spaces.
“One of my professional theater experiences took place in the Chicago storefront scene, which means that I’ve done a lot of shows that were performed in places that were not intended to be theaters when they were built,” he said. “They were small rooms often converted into shops and warehouses . . . and it forces theater people to make very creative decisions in how they utilize the space.
“So coming into a small place like this is a bit more comfortable for me then performing in the auditorium because I’ve done so many more shows in smaller spaces then I had in bigger spaces.”
