Three entirely student-led senior-directed shows marked the final productions of the 2024 theater season on Thursday, May 2 and Friday, May 3 in the Big Black Box. The three plays – Café Murder, Greek Olympiaganza, and Clue were each directed by a different team of directors and featured casts of primarily underclassmen.
The senior-directed shows are a longstanding tradition within the theater program. They are a crucial opportunity for seniors to take the helm, while also providing a chance for many freshmen and sophomores to perform. Many underclassmen don’t have that opportunity prior in the year, due to casts of mainly upperclassmen.
“[Senior-directed was really cool,” performer Sophia Nikazm ‘27 said. “Because this is my first Westwood show, [the seniors] taught us all the traditions and they were really welcoming.”
Additionally, the student-led productions created an especially collaborative creative environment, where the directors and actors worked together to develop the production aspects of the show.
“It feels less like you’re intimidated by the directors, and more like you’re just a group of friends working together,” actor Koen Keene ‘27, who performed in Greek Olympiaganza, said. “Especially for my cast, [because] everybody in my cast I had known previously, and we’re all close friends. We all pitched in different ideas; if an actor had an idea, both the directors would take it into account to see if it would work.”
For the directors, the plays allow them to meet and work with most of the underclassmen in the program, and pass along knowledge and excitement for theater.
“My entire cast and crew [are] comprised of the swaggiest and most talented people I’ve ever met,” director Emily Rose ‘24 said. “The actors came to rehearsal every day with so much energy and they killed it.”
Each production also had its own individual challenges. For Café Murder, almost half the show relied on improvised responses to audience questions, meaning the performers and directors had to conquer the skill of improv as well.
“We spent a lot of time playing improv games,” Nikazm said. “We would go over the questions and try to come up with different answers each time. I hadn’t done an improv show before, so that was a cool experience.”
Overall, the senior-directed play series brought the Westwood theater season to a close with three collaborative productions focused on discovering and developing the younger generation of performers and technicians.
“I loved working on senior-directed so much,” Rose said. “It was one of the best experiences I’ve had at Westwood Theater.”