The Pleasant Valley Drama Department is embracing the spirit of inclusion this year as they begin preparing for their spring show, “She Kills Monsters.”
The PV community has long been advocating towards eliminating erroneous stigmas and the PVHS drama department is hoping their choice for the school’s spring play will show that.
“She Kills Monsters” shares the story of a middle-aged woman named Agnes as she journeys through the trials of understanding of her sister’s untimely death. Agnes and her sister, Tilly, have never shared a close bond. After Tilly’s incident, Agnes takes it upon herself to learn more about her siblings way of life.
Through her search, she discovers Tilly’s “Dungeons and Dragons” module. Also known as D&D, Dungeons and Dragons is a role-playing game in which players create characters and go on quests. Pleasant Valley senior and cast member, Jimmy Guest, said “A large amount of the play takes place inside a Dungeons and Dragons world created by Tilly.” The show is an imaginative, live-action adventure as Agnes and her friends bring Tilly’s D&D module to life.
But it isn’t the plot that has so many around PV’s halls most excited. The play puts a focus on embracing the LGBTQ community and eliminating the stigma around queer romance while also attempting to dismiss gender roles. “The show focuses more on sexuality and being an outcast in high school. Many of the main characters in the module are queer,” Pleasant Valley Junior and cast member Anna Myatt said. “The show examines, through fantasy, the reality of being a gay teenager–undergoing bullying and harassment,” she added.
Freshman cast member Harper Clark said, “The show combats gender norms by not only having the main character as a woman, but her sidekicks as females, too. They do a lot of the fighting, and it’s cool to see females kicking some butt.”
To help prepare the cast for the intensive battle scenes, drama director William Myatt hired a fighting specialist to help choreograph and teach the cast the intricacies of stage combat.
With the show taking place on April 26 and 27, the cast sees it as a great opportunity to celebrate LGBTQ rights and is hopeful the community will embrace their creativity and open-mindedness.
