THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 15, 1995 TAG: 9502160552
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KRYS STEFANSKY, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 180 lines
MATT BALL spins to the right, swivels to the front, forward, then back. Music drowns out the noise of stamping feet. Ball and other buccaneers throw out a tangle of arms and holler a big ``Yo ho!,'' more or less on cue. The music stops. Pirates mill around, waiting for instructions. Masking tape stuck to the floor of this classroom in the west wing at Princess Anne High School in Virginia Beach is ragged from ``Peter Pan'' rehearsals.
``I want to do some more,'' the 20-year-old Ball demands loudly from his wheelchair, at a standstill without anyone to push it.
His teachers grin. Just four more weeks till the curtain goes up on this production, ready or not. Borrowed costumes are dribbling in. Work on the backdrop is going at a snail's pace. For some kids, memorizing lines is as hard as. . . learning to fly.
Not everyone would volunteer to direct a play whose cast and crew is made up of teenagers with a remarkable list of disabilities. Not everyone would think these students could pull it off. Walkers, wheelchairs, cerebral palsy, mental retardation, the threat of seizures - they call for unconventional theater.
Michael H. Parker is an unconventional guy. The 40-year-old Chesapeake resident is a graduate student on a grant at Old Dominion University. He's also a former shipyard worker, laid off two days before Christmas a year ago.
``Musicals are not my genre,'' he says, shrugging his shoulders. But this musical, his genre or not, is Parker's creative brainchild. He's the director.
Parker, who's been active in theater for more than 20 years, is a partner in B.D. Imaginings, a small theatrical production company in Virginia Beach that does video and live entertainment production.
He was taking a required course in special education when he visited the Kempsville Playhouse at the Kempsville Community Recreation Center in Virginia Beach.
``I walked in and said to myself, `Hey, we need to do barrier-free theater here,' '' he recalled. He found out about Very Special Arts Virginia - Virginia Beach, a nonprofit organization that provides opportunities in the arts for children with disabilities. One of its coordinators, Shirley Shapiro, teaches art at Princess Anne High School.
``Michael called me and said, `I want to do something with teenagers,' and I told him, `Oh, have I got 80 kids for you,' '' Shapiro said.
Last fall, he met them.
``Kids are kids and everybody's got their own challenges. These are a little more obvious than most. Take Vince,'' he said about Vince Barker, a young man unable to speak. The 17-year-old plays Sneed The Pirate, ``He's like a computer with a bad printer, waiting for it to catch up with him.'' Because Barker struck him as perfect for the role in tryouts, Parker rewrote the script so other actors appear to repeat what only they can hear Sneed say.
To keep the play flowing, gifted and drama students within the school district are the performers' on-stage shadows, prompting lines and movements. Financial help came from the business and arts communities and from the city. Within weeks, the production united several area talents and resources. Produced by Very Special Arts Virginia - Virginia Beach, the play's choreography is by Frank Bove, director of the Virginia Ballet Theater. Musical direction is by Cindy Cefalu, music therapist with Virginia Beach Public Schools.
Shapiro, a special education art teacher for Virginia Beach public schools, has been the production's visionary and cheerleader even while on medical leave this winter. Her co-coordinator in Very Special Arts Virginia - Virginia Beach, Elaine Hutcheson, subbed for Shapiro as itinerant art teacher and, with an iron hand, kept the details of the production straight.
Once the groundwork was laid last fall, the real work began.
Easily rattled by change, the students' first hurdle was getting used to Parker, a big man with voice to match, a moustache and shoulder-length hair streaked with gray.
``When I got Shirley's endorsement, they decided this is a fun guy class,'' Parker recalled, eyes crinkling behind wire-rimmed specs.
They started with a partly painted canvas - the backdrop for the forest of Neverland where the Lost Boys play. Over several class meetings, students in wheelchairs rolled up to a table with the canvas draped across it and stenciled leaves and berries, shadows and light into the woods. Others, like Billy Craft, 17, sprawled on dry sections on the floor to paint.
``Really, if the opera were doing this, they'd be doing the same thing,'' said Parker, red berry paint smeared on his fingers.
Right. For some of this cast and crew, the instruction to pat a paint-dipped, leaf-shaped sponge up and down can be an enormous challenge. During work sessions, several students fought rebellious arm and hand muscles and painted to an encouraging chorus of adults who reminded them at each step, ``Put the sponge on the paper, down, down, on the tree, good, OK, now lift it up.'' The stenciling alone took three weeks, working three mornings a week.
``We're trying to get them to do as much of the work as possible,'' said Hutcheson. ``The thing drama does for them is give them self-confidence. And they're developing a whole work ethic, coming in, taking their shoes off and getting to work.''
The students started diction exercises before the winter holidays. Parker held tryouts, then tailored the script to suit the players. Some kids couldn't read; others didn't understand how to take turns with dialogue. Parker tossed out lines, added narrators and rewrote the script so it made sense to the actors and fit their quirks. The first to go were contractions.
``They won't read `don't' or `can't,' '' Parker said, grinning. ``Had to change them all to `do not' and `can not.' ''
Amber Oglesby, a shy, dimpled, pixie-ish strawberry blonde prone to giggle fits, is the youngest actor at just-turned-15. She plays the lead, Peter Pan. When she and 21-year-old Sonia Knight, who plays Wendy, stumbled over sentence fragments, Parker made them complete sentences.
Amber's confidence grew during rehearsals.
``This is fun,'' she said two days into learning her lines. ``Real fun.'' Maybe it's the one-on-one attention; maybe it's because she's constantly ribbed about being the star. Magic happened, say teachers who've watched her gabbing with new friends in the cafeteria.
Teachers rattle off what the kids learned during ``Peter Pan'': memorization, gross and fine motor skills, staying on task, social skills, communication skills. Then they list bigger plusses - shy teenagers who blossomed during the past weeks.
No matter how the public reacts to performances that will almost certainly include miscues and awkward moments, say teachers, it will have been worth it.
``People in theater here,'' said Cefalu, the music teacher, referring to the high school's drama department, ``have told us that there are going to be hecklers no matter who's on stage. I think it's part of life, and these kids are going to have to deal with it, and you can't shelter them.''
Certainly not in the glare of the footlights.
Nobody is more aware of the risk than Shapiro, herself the mother of a disabled daughter.
As the students tried to follow the dancer's lead and occasionally bumped into each other, she grinned good-naturedly and laughed.
``Brandy Richardson's mom called me the other day, thrilled because Brandy showed her what she was doing in rehearsals,'' Shapiro said. Since the 17-year-old doesn't speak, she acted out the entire dance sequence.
Another parent, Donna Heuneman, sat through a rehearsal and watched as her son, Jeremy Zoby, 17, one of the Lost Boys, got the hang of one tricky move after another.
She wanted her son involved in the play because she hoped he'd be socializing with students outside the special education department.
The shadows answered that prayer. Gifted students and those involved in drama weren't easy to lure to the high school to be shadows since both are usually involved in more than their share of after-school activities already. So Shapiro beamed as Dawn Adams, a Tallwood High School junior, latched onto Rachael Marini, 19, a special education student playing one of the Lost Boys. The two danced side-by-side, Dawn holding Rachael's hand or waist to help keep her attention on the work.
``You're doing great,'' Dawn said softly to her partner.
``They're not patronizing at all,'' said Shapiro of the shadows. ``They're just all thespians working together.'' Then she moaned. ``I'm so nervous. Are we gonna be ready?''
Ever unflappable, Parker smoothed down his ballcap.
``We've got plenty of time,'' he said listing other theatrical challenges he's faced. ``I've worked with juvenile delinquents, with Boy Scouts. That's why they call this `play.' '' ILLUSTRATION: Color photos
D. KEVIN ELLIOTT/Staff
Choreographer Frank Bove of the Virginia Ballet Theater instructs
Jennifer Savell, foreground center, and Kelly Bateman, to her right,
during a dress rehearsal.
Amber Oglesby, left, who plays Peter Pan, and Sonia Knight, who
plays Wendy, go over the script with director Michael Parker,
center.
Bill Craft, left, gets some tips from Michael Parker in painting one
of the many background scenes for the play.
Graphic
SHOW SCHEDULE
What: Public performances of ``Peter Pan'' by the Princess Anne
High School West Building Players
Where: Virginia Beach-Kempsville Community Recreation Center's
Kempsville Playhouse
When: Friday at 7 p.m., Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. Princess
Anne High School will host one performance open to the public at 7
p.m. Friday, Feb. 24
Tickets: $7 for adults, $5 for senior citizens and students, $3
for children under 12. For advance reservations and $2-off coupons,
call 497-7364.
by CNB