Fall Show: FOOLS Review
Abiding fans of theater have long awaited another spectacular play from our theater company after the successful musical production of “Mean Girls.” This fall play is a unique theatrical experience for being the first comedy that Ms. Phillips, as the drama teacher and coordinator, produced.
“Fools” is a comedic fable written by Neil Simon, an American playwright, screenwriter, and author; it tells the tale of a man named Leon Tolchinsky, an ordinary school teacher who just landed a marvelous teaching job in Kulyenchikov, Ukraine. However, when he arrives, he finds out that the town was cursed with chronic stupidity for 200 years. Unbeknownst to Leon, his real job is to break the curse by teaching a person to learn one thing. Unfortunately, no one tells him that if he stays over 24 hours and fails to break the curse, he too becomes stupid. Nevertheless, when he meets his student, Sophia Zubritsky, he devotes himself to teaching her due to him falling madly in love with her.
One of the best features of the play was the perfect visual appeal the theater company provided. Despite having limited items for background sets, tech managed to be resourceful and use many scenes of the play with the same background props. The attention to detail on the sets was spectacular yet simple, creating an amazing visual experience for the audience. In parts where the actors had to move from outside to inside of the Zubritsky home, the company created a moving wall, with one side being painted with exterior features and the other side decorated and painted with interior features.
“The play was spectacular and fun to watch,” Keppel junior, Maxine Penaojas, commented. “The acting was amazing, the actors made me truly believe that they were actually stupid. The play was well put together.”
Another great feature of this play was the actors themselves. Their incredible performance helped the audience understand the story more, from simple gestures to the emotion conveyed when voicing their lines, no matter what the context was behind it.
Yet, one major flaw that drove away some students from seeing this play was the preview of the play itself. The preview of the play was on Wednesday morning, during 4th-period instruction. There were three assemblies for certain people to attend based on where their class was. The preview of the play was about 20 minutes long for each assembly, including the amount of time for all of the classes to be there.
When asked about his opinion of the play, Keppel junior Timothy Lee stated, “I liked the play overall, it was pretty funny. Though, the preview for the play felt bland.”
The preview of the play consisted of two scenes, which would be normal considering it was supposed to be a short preview. However, the time segments of the two scenes were vastly different. The first scene that was shown was only about three minutes long, while the second preview was about 12 minutes long; this made the preview feel shorter than what it was supposed to be. The preview didn’t include the villain, one of the major characters in the story, which added to the boredom of the student audience.
Inevitably, the play would still be interesting to a majority of people, especially to non-Keppel students, adults, and siblings since they were unable to see the preview of the play themselves. In terms of complexity and execution, the play delivered enthusiasm and excitement to the audience.
