A train of magic is taking audience members to the theatre of the Pullman High School, where they will find themselves in an auditorium brimming with a seven-year comedy story.
PHS Drama Club is putting on the parody play “Puffs! Or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years At A Certain School of Magic and Magic.” The first weekend of shows just concluded, but others can see the show at 7 p.m. Nov. 9–11 and at 2 p.m. Nov. 10. The comedy is $5 to attend for youth and students and $10 to attend for adults.
PHS Drama Club strives to be a club that produces quality plays not just family members would want to come to see, director Andrew Mielke said. They hope their productions will become something community members outside of actors’ families would be excited about.
“I just think these young people really respond to us saying, ‘Here’s our expectations. Yes, things won’t be perfect, but I need you to do your best and don’t disappoint,’ and they don’t disappoint. I mean, they never do. It’s just as amazing,” Mielke said.
The whole production is student-led, Mielke said. The tech, sets, backstage and stage managing are all done by students once the shows begin.
“There’s not a mom back there saying, ‘You ready?’ so we kind of empower them. This is how theater works,” Meilke said.
The show has certain restraints when it comes to advertising and production, Meilke said. Since the show is a parody of a well-known book and movie series, there are a lot of plays on certain names to avoid copyright infringement. Hints about what the show is based on are usually indirect.
“If you see the show, you’ll obviously know what it is based on. It takes place over seven years, they take a train to get there, there’s a boy who lived and there’s a bad guy that we call Mr. Valdy,” Meilke said.
PHS Drama Club strives to still have a fun time aside from all the seriousness, assistant director Aryn Vance said. The club has begun to do more fun and social activities during rehearsal that make it more enjoyable.
“That’s when everybody’s laughing the most, and it is when we try to do things that maybe are a little bit better and out there. It makes the students feel a little more at ease,” Vance said.
