Bringing a childhood favorite to life, sophomores in Children’s Theater transported hundreds of elementary schoolers through the looking glass, into a mad world of whimsy and wonder in their production of Alice in Wonderland on Nov. 14-15 at the Raymond E. Hartfield Performing Arts Center (PAC). 

In their Theatre Production II class, the ensemble of primarily sophomores develops and rehearses the show during their class block for months, working together to pull off a very high-energy and technically ambitious production. 

“I think [the rehearsal process] was really fun,” Prishaa Vishwakarma ‘27, who portrayed Alice, said. “There were a lot of ‘lock in’ situations, [and] blocking every single scene every single class period did get tiring, but it was really fun to see the show come together.”

In addition to the opportunity to perform in the show, the class also took part in the behind-the-scenes and organizational aspects of putting together a production through committees. The class split into five committees that each handled a different part of the process, including the social, costuming, media, tech, and choreography committees.

“I was originally invited to be just a part of the costuming committee,” committee member Alex Rupe ‘27, who also portrayed the Queen of Hearts, said. “[The committee] worked together really hard — we came in early every morning to pull all these costumes, and it was really great. We made a really good community, and though stressful, [the hard work] was definitely worth it.”

Including the committees in the production process gives students the opportunity to dabble in more than just the performance aspect of theater, and it introduces them to new challenges and opportunities.

“We all had our own visions, and all of our visions were very different,” Rupe said. “When we finally decided on something, it was usually overruled by [Director Ms. Lydia Coats], who had another idea and so finding that middle ground of incorporating our ideas while still staying true to what our director wanted was definitely a fun challenge.”

Rupe was not the only student doing double-duty in the production. James Spector ‘27 acted as a performer, portraying the role of the King of Hearts, as well as taking his first foray into the world of directing as a student assistant director .

“I’ve only really worked as a singular role in past productions, so I’ve only been a tech member or an actor,” Spector said. “But for this one, I was both acting, I was assistant director, and I was also doing marketing for the show so it was a lot more responsibility, and that kind of made it a little more difficult, but I still enjoyed it a lot.”

Creating the world of Alice in Wonderland also provided Advanced Tech students, who were in charge of designing and creating the set pieces and props, an opportunity to stretch their creativity and flex their technical skills.

“It was really open-ended,” technician Dominik Brown ‘26 said. “They really let us do whatever we wanted, which was fun because usually you don’t get that much creative liberty.”

The technical design also included various puppets to represent some of the non-human characters in the show, such as the Cheshire Cat, the Jabberwocky, and the Caterpillar. The responsibility of creating the puppets fell to the technicians, who worked to both conceptualize and construct the puppets. 

“[The process involved] a lot of trouble shooting, like last minute we even had to alter puppets because actors couldn’t carry them,” Brown said. “It was just a lot of problem solving, [because] usually the focus is on the big set pieces, but [for children’s show] the focus was more on small, unique pieces like the puppets.”

All the class’ hard work culminated in a performance for third graders who attend the various elementary schools that feed to Westwood. During the school day on Nov. 15, busloads of  children arrived at the PAC, filling the house with an enthusiastic and energetic audience who was ready to engage with the show.

“[The most rewarding part of the production] was probably meeting all the kids,” Vishwakarma said. “It was socially tiring, especially after such a high energy show, but it was so nice to see them be like ‘Oh hey, look it’s Alice! Come here, come talk to us!’. A kid gave me a flower, and it was really sweet.” 

These performances for the elementary schoolers serve a dual purpose. For the children, it  gives them their first experience with live performances and teaches them audience etiquette. For the performers, they learn how to adapt to short attention spans and how to clearly present stories to keep the audience engaged.

“I got to run out into the lobby after [the show] and talk to all the kids,”  Adam Trenk ‘27, who portrayed the White Rabbit, said. “It was something about knowing that I am, in some way, their first experience with theater and that’s something I don’t take very lightly. I get to be the theater that people remember for a very long time, and I think that’s the most important part about [children’s show].”

Putting together a show of this scale means the ensemble spends a lot of time together to collaborate, which leads to the ensemble members forming a tightly knit community.

“I feel like there was more of a community in this show,” Vishwakarma said. “Past shows I’ve been in have also had a lot of [community], but I feel like in this show, everybody was in the same grade so they had similar experiences with school and stuff.”