Bath toys questioning their self-worth and the meaning of life, Conscious marshmallows watching their family die, Romeo pronouncing his love for Juliet to the wrong balcony, and plenty of other strange and silly plays all scattered in between Bailey, a bear, telling us her story of trying to join the school’s track team (a human’s school track team).

And Hilarity Ensued (Pursued by a Bear)  is a comedy that Leyden actors got to perform at West Leyden on November 20-22. Directed by Mr. Seyller, this play’s  cast and tech crew worked very hard to get this show ready to perform in just short of a month.

“The energy and the laughs. I think that’s the best thing. I loved coming to rehearsals and having an opportunity to work with everyone, and all of us just laughing at the silliness and all of the fun energy. It gave me a lot of joy,“ Mr. Seyller describes. And Hilarity Ensued had a very large cast that surely brought a lot of energy to rehearsals and performances. “It’s bringing back joy that I haven’t had since I was doing theater in high school. And for a long time, I’ve been like, Oh, I miss theater, I miss singing, I miss any and all performing aspects. And it brought a lot of that back for me. So that was really nice. I’m gonna miss that until next year, if hopefully I can do something again,” Mr .Seyller reminisces with a warm smile on his face.

Although it was a very fun run, not everything about the process was simple and easy. Juan Narvaez, the student technical director states, “The hardest part of the set was probably making the wall for Snow White and Los Siete Chilaquiles (a play in Hilarity Ensued). It was so complicated to attach to the frame and we couldn’t figure it out, the instructions literally felt like gibberish. Then when it flew down, when they opened the door the wall would swing a lot, so we had to add pins and put a weight on it in the back to sort of stop it from wiggling too much,” He firmly states. “Next were the windows for the bathtub scene. We had made them previously before this show, during Radium Girls, and they were horrible to make. Then mounting them on the rails system was horrible too since they got caught in the wires of the electricals, and the gold curtain got tangled in there too somehow and same with the traveler, and then some people were just not listening to the instructions we gave them so it slowed us down a bit,” Juan explains while clearly not thinking fondly of this memory at all. Thankfully, our tech crew was very determined and persistent. Despite all things that caused trouble, we ended up with beautifully detailed sets that completed the scenes and gave them the best imagery possible. “I am really proud of how the game center platform and wall turned out. It was really tough to build since we were cutting a thicker piece than usual so the saw almost sort of killed me…(no it didn’t it just stopped moving and i thought it broke it) Then came adding all the nerdy stuff for the wall. A lot of people let us borrow their stuff like plushies and card games, and we also got a lot of posters that made the wall look really good. Then for the platform we had monitors and more things people brought and it was really cool how it all came together. It looked amazing from the audience and like a true game store” Juan reassures.

 In the play, Bailey attempts to join a human track team but still faces discrimination simply because she’s a bear. Either way, she persists and joins anyway.  “My favorite part of playing Bailey was being able to express myself and show off ideas of how this character would act, since she is a teenager” Expresses Rubi Barrera. Hilarity Ensued was a very silly play that allowed for a lot of creative freedom. Especially when it came to the designs of the sets, lighting, sound, and costumes. Blacktop Jungle was a play of a first grader, Linda, who was not as bubbly or naive as you might expect “My favorite part about playing Linda was her attitude. I loved being able to give film noir detective energy while also making it clear that I was playing a child. It was a fun challenge to look past how humorous the concept was and play the character as seriously as kindergarteners take themselves,” says Brooke Rogers in a jolly tone. Brooke’s costume for Linda was surely one that stood out. An exaggerated long leather jacket with extravagant fur on the inside, a black fedora, and even sunglasses, added great contrast to the setting of a school playground. Her costume was the cherry on top to her serious and misfitting character. “I honestly loved everything about playing Linda. The only thing I even slightly disliked was when my lollipop prop turned out to be butterscotch flavored. First world problems, I know,” giggled Brooke. After that was Wrong Number, Romero!, a play about Romeo from Romeo and Juliet professing his love to the balcony of Juliet’s friend instead of following the widely well-known narrative by William Shakespeare. Miguel Sandoval, Romeo’s actor, illustrates how he personally felt about playing his character, “Romeo so far is my favorite role that I’ve played. There are actually two parts that made him my favorite role I’ve played. Before playing Romeo I didn’t know much of his story so I was tasked to watch one of the Romeo and Juliet movies. It was definitely one of my favorite parts about playing Romeo. The other reason I liked playing him is because he’s my first comedic role that I’ve played. Going from more serious characters to a more comedic one was very fun,” All performances went well with the largest audience on Friday afternoon.

 The next Leyden theatre performance will be on December 15th. The West Leyden theater class will be performing The 12 Worst Breakups of All Time in the west auditorium at 6:30 pm and the east class will be performing Every Novel You Read in Highschool at 7:30.