Leechburg students to perform 'Lucky Stiff' this weekend

Leechburg Area School District’s spring musical, the farce comedy “Lucky Stiff,” opens Friday for a three-day run in front of limited audiences.

Each of the roughly 35 cast and crew members will receive vouchers for two tickets, but tickets won’t be on sale to the public.

Alyssa Bruno Walls, drama club adviser and the play’s director, said the students haven’t been fazed by all the safety restrictions and uncertainty surrounding the production because of the covid-19 pandemic.

“They’re just so happy to be performing and to be with each other that it doesn’t matter,” she said.

Theater programs across Western Pennsylvania have made major adjustments to their performances this year. Several are livestreaming shows online, while others, such as Leechburg, are limiting ticket sales and requiring safety measures such as mask wearing and social distancing. Leechburg also plans to do temperature checks, will not offer concession and will extend intermission to allow for added sanitization.

In March of last year, Leechburg theater students learned their production of “Godspell” was being postponed the same day the musical was scheduled to open.

The students had been rehearsing for about two and a half months.

“We all just basically started crying,” said McKenna Pierce, 18, who is cast as Rita in “Lucky Stiff.”

Pierce and the other students assumed the delay would last only a few days or perhaps a few weeks at most. But in the weeks and months that followed, the play was scheduled and rescheduled again and again, until it seemed it was canceled for good.

“We didn’t know whether we’d be able to perform it,” Bruno Walls said.

In late November of last year, the students were cleared to go forward with “Godspell” and, after a rushed rehearsal, they performed it in January.

“It was frightening, but it was exciting,” said Tucker Spiering, 17, who had a role in “Godspell” and is cast as Harry Witherspoon, a lead character in “Lucky Stiff.” “Everything about the show we needed to memorize again. This is my sixth show here, and that was definitely one of the hardest things I’ve had to do.”

But students said it was a relief to not have all their rehearsals ultimately wasted. Now, as they prepare for “Lucky Stiff,” the students are adapting to the challenges of performing in the covid era.

“I think that, for most of us in this cast, we are responsible enough to understand the situation here,” said Ivan Guo, 17, who plays Luigi Gaudi.

“If one person goes out, we either have to postpone the entire show due to contact tracing, or cancel it altogether … I feel that for the majority of the cast, we are mature, we are responsible enough to understand what’s at stake here,” Guo added.

Masks are required during rehearsals and will be worn through the show, and students are required to stay physically distanced from one another as much as possible — a challenge for certain parts of the storyline.

At one point in the production, Spiering’s character shares a kiss with another. Bruno Walls said the performers will instead turn their heads to make it appears as if they’re kissing, as the lights fade into a blackout.

“We’re coming up with different ways to make it look as real as possible,” Spiering said.

There also is a prohibition on prop-sharing. Items can’t be passed to different actors as they normally would, and the props are being sanitized on a daily basis.

Rehearsals have repeatedly been affected by students having to quarantine after exposure to the virus. In late January, a group of eighth grade actors and crew had to quarantine after covid exposures. Last month, the high school closed temporarily because seven cases were reported, and several actors — including two female leads — had to quarantine.

As opening night approaches, Bruno Walls said students in quarantine have called into rehearsals over the phone or FaceTime, to practice their lines virtually.

“We’ve got to roll with the punches because we really don’t know who could be quarantined at what time,” Pierce said.

While “Godspell’s” subject matter — telling the story of a community formed after the death of Jesus to carry on his teachings — is serious, this year’s musical is anything but serious.

Based on the 1983 novel, “The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo,” “Lucky Stiff” is a comedic take on a murder mystery that takes off when a down-on-his-luck Englishman learns an uncle he’s never met has left him $6 million.

“The content of ‘Godspell’ was very heavy, and the content of this was just completely different,” Bruno Walls said. “It’s nice to see the kids let loose and have a good time.”

Pierce added: “The show is just, like, crazy. I have a very strong personality, and I basically get to be myself up there.”