Sigourney Weaver makes appearance at North Bergen (NJ H.S. production of 'Alien'

[scooter]

Sigourney Weaver makes appearance at North Bergen H.S. production of 'Alien' on Friday

Some highlights, if you're not able to access the link:

The biggest sensation of "Alien," the much-talked-about North Bergen High School play that got an encore performance Friday night, was not the flashing, rumbling special effects, the incredible sets made of flotsam and jetsam, the monsters popping out of chests, or even the alien itself, stalking people in the aisle seats.

The biggest sensation was Sigourney Weaver, in person — the star of the original 1979 movie "Alien," who made a special trip to North Bergen to give her blessing.

"How exciting is it to be here tonight?" Weaver said, before the curtain rose, as the overflow crowd of 800 in the school auditorium went wild.

"This is the night I've been waiting for!" Weaver told the crowd. "I've only been here a couple of hours, but I can tell this is a very special place in a very special town, and in a school like this you have extraordinary teachers...I met the students and I want to say they are so great."

Weaver's presence at what is — at the end of the day — a New Jersey high school play, suggests just how unusual the saga of this production is.

There are other signs that this "Alien" is extraordinary. The fact, for starters, that Ridley Scott, the director of the 1979 film, donated $5,000 to the school after hearing about the show.

The fact that the New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts has announced it is awarding $1,000 scholarships to all the cast and crew (a few will get $10,000 scholarships).

Marc Zicree, a writer who has worked on "Star Trek: The Next Generation," flew all the way from Los Angeles to see the production and cheer on the students. And Sam Mercer, of Vienna, Virginia, drove five hours to North Bergen to see it, not even knowing whether he could get a ticket (he snagged one at the last minute). "I didn't think I was going to get in until one minute before the play," he said.

The amazing thing about the show is not just the sophistication, the imagination, the technical brilliance of the show, but the fact that (director-writer Perfecto) Cuervo, his team, and his actors made it out of almost nothing.

I wonder what Adam Savage would have thought of this.

[zenrat]

That's pretty cool.

[NARSES2]

That's pretty cool.

Yup. Certainly beats the couple we were "made" to put on back in day 

It was always a problem when it came to casting basically because of being an all boys school. Eventually when we "did" Oliver (and boy did we "do" it"  ) they decided to ask the girls school next door for a couple of volunteers 

[Weaver]

I wonder what Adam Savage would have thought of this.

Funny you should ask...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKrpiCqZq_8

[scooter]

I wonder what Adam Savage would have thought of this.

Funny you should ask...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKrpiCqZq_8

And this is why we need more secondary school teachers willing to explore differing creative outlets.

[zenrat]

That's pretty cool.

Yup. Certainly beats the couple we were "made" to put on back in day 

It was always a problem when it came to casting basically because of being an all boys school. Eventually when we "did" Oliver (and boy did we "do" it"  ) they decided to ask the girls school next door for a couple of volunteers 

These days you could do a production of John Carpenters "The Thing".  I re-watched it last week.  Unless one of the dogs was a girl then there are no females in it at all - perfect for an all boys school.

[NARSES2]

Having attended an all boys school it was always amusing when the annual school play was being cast. Our English master always tried to find a play with a minimal female cast, but you's always end up with a couple of roles needing filling. This led to the inevitable hiding behind desk lids while he was calling out names  For some reason a lad called Banks always got one of the female roles - he was school and Coydon boxing champ and no one said a thing about it to him 

By the time we got to the fifth year he'd left (as half the school did at 15) so we had a joint production with the girls school next door.

[Weaver]

That's pretty cool.

Yup. Certainly beats the couple we were "made" to put on back in day 

It was always a problem when it came to casting basically because of being an all boys school. Eventually when we "did" Oliver (and boy did we "do" it"  ) they decided to ask the girls school next door for a couple of volunteers 

These days you could do a production of John Carpenters "The Thing".  I watched it last week.  Unless one of the dogs was a girl then there are no females in it at all - perfect for an all boys school.

Some serious challenges for the costume/special effects though, if you want to follow the film closely. You need real-looking people to morph and split up, and 'monsters' that have convincing faces and body parts as part of them. There's also the matter of flamethrowers. North Bergen got around this by exploiting the convenient fact that Dallas was separate from the rest of the crew when he went into the air ducts, so they filmed his point-of-view footage outside first, then you only saw the 'live' footage on screen in the theatre. Not sure that that would work for The Thing...

Another one that occured to me was Das Boot. Again, some serious set-building and/or a degree of imagination on the part of the audience required.