Spring Valley just recently put on their annual musical and it was a hit. Little Shop Of Horrors was open for five showings during the first week of February and the theater was packed. The story of Seymour and his human-eating plant, Audrey II, took the stage after months of rehearsals.  The process was a long road, especially with COVID struggles, but they ended up putting on a great show. 

“I think I fit the look of it and it’s easy for me to fall into the character when I already really like the movie and have a deep appreciation for practical effects.” said Adam Sterling, who played Seymour, “Going down pod number 4 [the plant] and the tech aspect of it, the giant wooden mechanism. That was so fun!” 

Theater tech worked hard for weeks to perfect the sets and props. The plant, Audrey II, took different forms over the course of the musical. First, it started as a small plant and eventually grew into a huge mechanism that had to be operated and moved around by a person, Theo Collumb. The plant in its final form opens at the mouth and allows the actors to crawl through in order to ‘die’ in the show. 

“I really enjoyed meeting a lot of people, because most of these people I did not know and I have more friends now,” said dancer Kamil Richardson. Everyone involved grew as a family and created a community within themselves. Cole McCrossen, who played Orin (the dentist) said he loved that part of the last few months, “Meeting everyone and getting to have a relationship with everyone because we came to school every day so we got to be close with everybody. You know, getting to know everybody and then trusting everyone,” 

“I think I grew projection-wise,” noted lead Aileen Fouts, who played Audrey, ¨It’s been so long since I’ve performed on an actual stage for a lot of people so being able to sing to hundreds of people every day, I grew in that aspect. As well as, acting. Really portraying my character, really portraying my emotions, making sure that everyone understands what’s happening on stage. I think I really grew in that aspect as well.” After a pause due to COVID, Fouts was excited to return to the stage. 

For actors and dancers alike, COVID created a whole pile of problems. “For me as an actor, and for the dancers, it’s hard for us all to breathe. For actors, it’s hard for the mics,” said Ella Pesqueira, who played Mr. Mushnik. The theater department even had to take a short pause in order to quarantine. 

Now that the play is over, actors have reflected on their time spent in the theater, “I didn’t cry as much on closing night as I thought I would, I cried way more on senior night and then when I got home and everyone was posting all of their posts and tagging me and I was like ‘There it is, now I’m going to cry,’ Just really bittersweet,” said Sterling.