The Livingston High School Theater Department fall play, “Pride and Prejudice,” will be held next week. Evening performances will be held at 7 p.m. on November 16, 17, and 18. There will also be a 2 p.m. matinee on November 18.
Based on Jane Austen’s 1813 novel, adapted by Jon Jory, the play features a cast of 35 LHS students and dozens more working behind the scenes as crew members. The production is led by director Scott Patteson, in his fourth year at LHS, and features choreography by student Ava-Rachel Lieber.
“This production gave our students a wonderful opportunity to explore one ofhistory’s most enduringpieces of literature,” Patteson said. “It’s a refreshingly zippy adaptation that doesn’t skimp on any of the humor from Austen’s original text.”
Patteson said that a professional dialect coach was brought in to teach the cast how to speak with a proper British accent.
"The characters are so over-the-top, and the language is so verbose, but the student actors have exceeded all my expectations,” Patteson said.
Behind the scenes, the production team, led by teacher Brian Megaro, has been busy with set-building, costume design, lighting and more. The costume crew, run by volunteer Barbara Geiger and teacher Alyssa Lamedica, have brought fabric creations to life that give visual cues to the characters’ personalities, social status, occupation, and the aesthetic of the time period.
As Geiger explained, “The students work long hours behind the scenes organizing, measuring, fitting, cutting, pinning, sewing, hot gluing, ironing and steaming.” Geiger said. “Call us ‘prejudiced,’ [but] we think they’ve done a fabulous job!”
Tickets may be purchased at lhstheater.com.
