The “Jack and Jill Plays” are being shown from March 21-24 at 7 p.m at the Black Box theater. The play is a series of short stories exploring the ups and downs of Jack and Jill’s relationship and many themes like love, death, and fun. Four of the cast members share their experiences from working on the play.

Elijah Tinker – Jack
Rachel Kaufman – Jack
Adelaide Bracewell – Jill
Maddie Easlon – Jill

Why should people watch this play?
Rachel – You can look back at the play and remember moments from it. It’s very beautiful, you can come back to it and you can enjoy all the small moments in it.
Adelaide – I’m a huge fan. You can come away with many scenes from the play still in your head. It’s really powerful and we worked very hard to put it together.
Maddie – There’s lots of special moments. It’s heart wrenching, surreal, everyone in the cast has put work in. you’ll leave feeling that you’ve watched something gorgeous.
Elijah – There are a lot of plays that have this big plot and meaning, but this play is a lot smaller in scale. It focuses on the little moments in your life, and that can be really moving.
How would you describe this play in one sentence?
Rachel – A series of moments in your life.
Adelaide – A story of a relationship in a very non-linear way.
Maddie – All the things you love.
Elijah – I can’t summarize it in one sentence. If I had to summarize it in one word, it’s life.

Describe your character, what makes them interesting?
Rachel – Always searching for meaning. I play Jack. He’s always looking to see Jill have joy. He’s quite childish.
Adelaide – It’s a double cast so you should come for two nights as our interpretations of the characters are completely different. The characters are grounded and feel like people in real life. Jill specifically, is always up and down and has extreme emotions. Jack gives Jill hope, They’re always trying to save each other just like a real relationship.
Elijah – My Jack, I guess I’d say that he thinks a lot but doesn’t do anything about it. He’s always worried about finding the people and things he loves.
How do you personally connect with your character?
Rachel – Like Elijah was saying, I haven’t had a lot of Jack’s experiences, but I relate to how he acts and how he is good hearted but doesn’t always think about the consequences.
Adelaide – We were cast pretty well. I think we can all relate to our characters. A lot of scenes were cut from the play so many of the moments with our characters were removed. We had to piece together the rest of the play without some of our favorite character moments.
Maddie – I do relate to Jill. I think in every one of her moments I take a piece of her; she’s very complex and real. There are so many lines where I just feel it.
Elijah – I feel like the same person sometimes, but Jack’s just had more life experience, but we’re also both childish, we’re both in our heads a lot. I Identify with how he copes and processes life.

What were the challenges you faced when putting on this play?
Rachel – There are so many props that we need to remember. We just bought a lot of new props and it can be really overwhelming. We need to remember where to put them and they kinda become an afterthought after line memorization.
Adelaide – Lots of scenes were cut in production so transitioning from one scene to the next has become a lot more confusing.
Maddie – It is hard to stay in character. Since the story is nonlinear, the transitions can be really hard. A funny scene transitions into a sad scene, and then it transitions into a semi-funny scene. So it’s hard to stay in character.
Elijah – Memorization, there are so many lines, and with this and keeping up with other classes. It’s been hard. A lot of times it’s easier to memorize when things come, and since this play is nonlinear it’s hard to remember what comes next, so the memorization is hard. Like, lines have to be almost second-nature, but the scenes are so different that it’s hard to stay in character the whole time.

How was putting on this play different from previous school plays you’ve put together?
Rachel – It’s so different from the musical that we put on earlier. That was campy, this is a lot more intimate.
Adelaide – Smallest cast we’ve had so far, auditions were hard. We’re all juniors so we got in our head. Mr. Payne treats us like adults, which I appreciate, but that can be hard.
Maddie – We are the first high school to put on this play. The characters are so complex and I don’t think many schools would be doing it. But we read it last year and I immediately fell in love.
Elijah – There were 48 auditions and 16 got the part. Mr. Payne gives us interesting plays. Many schools wouldn’t take on this project. We’re playing characters much more complex than a lot of high schoolers would play.