OPINION: “It’s Not You, It’s Me”

OPINION%3A+Its+Not+You%2C+Its+Me

Heather Garrison, Contributer

The lights rise on a small scene, a table in a restaurant is occupied by a male and a female. Music begins playing “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dion, and the male begins making odd hand motions and lip-syncing to the music. The female looks extremely uncomfortable and is checking to see who is watching. The male gets more dramatic as the song goes on, eventually standing on his chair as the song ends.

This is the opening to the very entertaining play, “It’s Not You, It’s Me,” the last show of the year from theater production students.

The play is about Jack and Catherine, a guy and a girl who have never met but share similar situations. Jack and Catherine keep getting dumped by some very interesting characters. Jack is dating girls that are interested only in appearance, status, and winning. Catherine is dating guys interested only in Sports Center, fantasies, and music. The short, staggered scenes are all very interesting, and most of them were funny. There were some scenes that I was almost crying from laughter, and yet I always went back to feeling sorry for the main characters. They definitely played with my emotions throughout the whole play and that is exactly what I was hoping for.

Surprisingly, I heard from multiple theater production and tech students that the play would be bad, which is why I wanted to cover it in the first place. I have never heard of the theater kids producing something bad. After seeing “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown,” I thought these students were more than capable of producing amazing results. It turns out that it was a very good play, at least from the audience’s point of view. I spoke to Callie Roberson, after the play, and she informed me that Joseph Manor-who played Jack-skipped multiple pages of lines. The actors were very good at covering up any mistakes made, because I did not notice any mess-ups until Roberson told me of Joseph’s error. The improvisation was spectacular. The theater kids are very talented, and I look forward to watching them gain experience and grow in the years to come.