By Chelsea McMaster By Jennifer

Russell-Bickford,Lisbon High School Lisbon High School

The Regional Drama Festival in Yarmouth on March 18 and 19 concluded the year for Lisbon Drama. The cast, crew and director faced many challenges and obstacles in the production of this play. After changing scripts a month into practices and losing a key actor soon after that, everyone involved was required to dedicate a large amount of time and effort to the production. Because of quite a few snow days, key rehearsals were lost, and the regional festival was even postponed. Regardless of these setbacks and challenges, Lisbon still managed to perform quite well at Yarmouth.

“Tuna Fish Eulogy” was the title of this year’s play. The storyline was quite confusing at the beginning, but after a few read-throughs, it became clearer. As this was an abstract play, the setting was courtroom-like, but not completely concrete. The main character, Albert, had summoned his mother and baby-sitter to discuss his death of 12 years earlier. Though the cause of death had supposedly been determined, he wanted his mother to know what really happened. She knew that he had died from eating expired tuna fish, but, during the course of the play, it was discovered that his baby-sitter had actually force-fed him the tuna. In addition to this becoming clear, the mother also tried to make Albert understand how much she loved him even though everyone thought she was a bad mother. The baby-sitter also explained her thoughts and actions to the audience, Albert and the mother. The play consisted of many flashbacks and quite a few overlapping lines. This made it abstract, but also quite interesting. It was an experience for all, because nobody had been involved in this type of play before.

Though Lisbon did not place at the Regional competition, the entire cast and crew did the best they could during the performance. It was a learning experience for everyone involved in the process. A special thanks goes to Ms. Young, the director of this play. She took on quite a load and did an amazing job with this play. Thank you also to the cast and crew for all of their hard work and dedication. Good luck to everyone next year!

Lisbon High School’s Drama Club recently performed their play ‘Tuna Fish Eulogy.” After a tumultuous start the Drama Club settled down and made it through their first performance. On Fri., Mar. 4, the cast presented the play at the Mountain Valley Conference at Hall-Dale High School. For a first performance, the cast performed relatively well; especially considering the amount of ensemble and chorus that the script requires. Although some lines were skipped, they made it through scotch-free and the audience was none the wiser. Chelsea McMaster and Jennifer Russell-Bickford were both awarded an All Festival Cast Award for their portrayals of Ms. Scully and Cherry.

After Hall-Dale, the cast knew that more rehearsals were needed and everyone worked twice as hard on memorizing lines and performing to their best potential. The Maine Regional Drama Festival was to be performed at Yarmouth the weekend of Mar. 11 and 12, but unfortunately the festival was postponed until the following weekend due to a snowstorm.

This year the festival was divided into two classes, by student population. The festival included Class A schools (over 550 students) and Class B schools (less than 550 students) schools competing for the chance to perform at the State level. Lisbon competed at the Class B level against Georges Valley, Yarmouth, and Boothbay.

The entire cast was quite nervous and excited before they went on stage but the play was astounding, the best they had ever performed. The judges mentioned in the critique how the acting was great and there was very good characterization. At the end of the night, the festival concluded with a dance and the judge’s results. Class A results included: Deering’s “A Thurber Carnival” as runner up and Morse’s “Goodnight, Fletcher” as the winner. Class B: Boothbay’s “The Seussification of Romeo and Juliet” was runner up and Yarmouth’s “The Diviners” took first. Lisbon’s Jennifer Russell- Bickford was awarded an All Festival Cast Award at the Regional competition. Although there were high hopes of placing, Lisbon performed to their best ability and put on an amazing performance.

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