One weekend. One weekend of singing, judges, hotels, music, acting, and friends and teachers gathered from all across the state, and most importantly awards. Perry Theatre Company and Advanced Technical Theatre won a plethora of awards and made an overall outstanding showing at State.
The theatre company performed in different categories at state, including: solo musical, duo musical, group musical, readers theatre, monologues, duo acting and group acting as well as performing a one act version of the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
“At state we performed Putnam for three judges from around Arizona who ranked us on characterization, movement, our set, and our lighting and sound designs…Because we got the highest scores out of all 25 schools in Arizona we were chosen to represent all of Arizona and perform Putnam at the International Thespian Festival,” explained Junior Rachael Sharp, and a member of the Putnam cast.
The entire crew and cast made an excellent showing and even qualified for nationals, and “To top it all off, we were given the Gold Honor Troupe award for Perry Theatre’s activities,” said Shawna Marquis, the Theatre Arts and Perry Theatre Company teacher.
At state, Rachael Sharp, Senior Natalie Nielsen, and Junior Jakob Wilcoxson were chosen to be a part of the Playwrights event and the students were able to rub elbows with incredible directors and playwrights.
The tech team, Sophomore Arianna Fiandaca, Senior Alex Doudna, and Junior Maya Whitaker, won 2nd place in Rigging in the Tech Challenge event. Three of the Tech Theatre Students, Tyler Townsend, Alex Doudna, Maya Whitaker, were selected to be part of the All State Tech Crew.
In addition, the Arizona Thespian Organization, chose to honor Mr. Jim Fountain as one of the best theatre coaches from this region for the year by naming him Coach of the Year. Fountain commented, “It’s a real honor to be recognized by your colleagues. It’s a really nice way to finish my career, a very nice crowning jewel.”