January 11th-14th, Riverside Brookfield High School theater and tech students returned to the 48th annual Illinois High School Theatre Festival for the first time in four years. Theatre Fest, which was hosted at Illinois State University, brings together high school theater students from all over Illinois to connect and collaborate regarding theater and technical production.
The annual theater festival, which has been attended by many schools across the state, includes many activities for theater students and tech students alike, including workshops and productions put on by other schools to see. Colleen Fischer, paraprofessional and theater director at RB, has taken students to Theatre Fest five times in the past nine years. Prior to this year, COVID-19 caused the cancellation of the past two festivals, making this RB’s first time back since 2020.
“We went in 2020 before COVID, and the next year we actually had three people on the All-State production, but there wasn’t a Theatre Fest. And then, in 2022 we were supposed to go, and they canceled it the week of. So we actually haven’t gone since 2020,” Fischer said.
The All-State production, a play or musical consisting of students from high schools all across the state, is one of the main attractions that can be seen at Theatre Fest. Two RB tech seniors, Cameron Dominick and Elli Krivak, participated in the tech crew for the production.
“There’s always a big All-State show which any school from the state can audition for in June. We actually had two students audition, and you can also join the tech crew. So we had two on crew for All-State [Cameron and Elli],” Fischer said.
For students, Theatre Fest offers varieties of activities and opportunities. Diverse amounts of workshops and classes for students to partake in are offered, ranging from working on set to makeup and costumes.
“They kind of range from any gambit of works in theater production. They also do stuff on set design. They do stuff on producing. So they kind of have every avenue of theater,” Fischer said.
Fischer’s excitement to return to Theatre Fest was prevalent throughout the weekend. Being many students’ first time attending Theatre Fest, Fischer was elated to return with new students.
“I think I’m just so thrilled I get to take students again ‘cause it has been a couple of years, and for me this was always such a formidable experience of being in high school and being a theater student, and I was so excited to get to expose them to just what neat opportunity it is,” Fischer said.
Junior Bennet Janunas attended the festival for the first time this year. Janunas, who has participated in theater since his freshman year, had an overall positive experience from his first visit.
“It’s been awhile since RB has gone, and it’s been canceled the last two years due to COVID, so this is the first year kind of like back and into it. It was my first year going. It was a really cool experience overall,” Janunas said.
Theatre Fest offers many eye opening opportunities for students participating in high school theater, creating an abundance of opportunities to meet new people and branch out, outside of RB.
“I think the best part was definitely seeing the productions because I think it’s really valuable to like to see how other schools do things. Like if you’ve only been at RB productions you won’t know what happens at other schools,” Janunas said.
