Directing the Young Actors’ Company production of Qui Nguyen’s She Kills Monsters: Young Adventures Edition is Richie Wilcox’s first time being involved with Neptune Theatre School. This is an elite training program for students between the ages of thirteen and eighteen who show exceptional talent in acting and wish to advance their skills. The students work with a professional creative team to hone their skills and the culmination of the program is a full-scale production on Neptune Theatre’s Scotiabank Stage. The Company has a long and impressive history, and counts among its alumni a wide array of actors, directors, playwrights, stage managers, and designers (and at least one theatre critic) who work professionally in theatres around Nova Scotia, and across the country. I sat down with Wilcox and two of the company members, Jillian Peters, who plays Agnes Evans, and Phoebe Rex, who plays Tillie Evans, at Neptune to chat about the show.
“My character is Tillie Evans,” says Rex, “She’s a sister of Agnes, and she died the year before the play takes place. She was a Dungeons and Dragons legend in their little area. She’s a Paladin and Agnes gets to meet her as her character Tillius (in the game), who I think is the stronger version of Tillie, or who Tillie wanted to be be, ideally, in the real world. I think this module that Agnes finds that Tillie had written herself really reflects what her ideal world would be.”
“Agnes finds this module and decides that she wants to go and find what it means,” explains Peters, “and the play is a huge journey of her learning what Dungeons and Dragons is, learning about her sister, and trying to connect with her through this game. [She is] learning why [Tillie] liked this game, learning about her life- she didn’t have this relationship with her before- and she’s connecting with her through this game and through playing it.”
“It’s quite beautiful,” says Wilcox, “It’s a a great layer to the show. The show is fantastical and fun, and funny, but, also, there is this portion of grieving process that at least weights it in something real. I didn’t know Dungeons and Dragons before this show, and many of the cast didn’t, and while, of course there will be insider jokes and information for the real D&D geeks, if you’re just learning about it, you’re still going to have a great time… We’ve played it now a couple of times in rehearsal, and I’ve had a great time. There is such a cult following to that game. We have had a D&D expert in Henri Gielis, so that we weren’t going to offend anyone with wrong game strategies or information.” “There have been a couple of close calls,” says Rex and they all laugh. “Henri is on top of it,” stresses Wilcox, “He created a module of D&D that features the characters of this play. We got to go and play the actual module that perhaps Tillie made.” “It was so fun too,” says Peters, “When you actually play the game you’re like, ‘oh, that [reference in the script] makes sense now.”
The cast have gotten to learn about stage combat from Karen Bassett and made puppets with Brian Riley.
“Karen Basset is our fight director,” says Peters, “She is amazing. She’s phenomenal. She taught us so much about fighting. She first gave us a class about punching and kicking, and then we get to use weapons in the show, which is so cool! We have swords, we have axes, we have maces, we have so much cool stuff. She taught us how to use them safely, and how to make it look realistic, while still being safe.” “I’d watch Karen teach them, and even just mapping thing out, and being able to fake that someone has been hit by a kick in the face, and which way to turn your head, and how to react, to progress to the point where it really does look like a kick in the head: I was amazed. I still am,” says Wilcox, “Brian Riley is a friend of mine who I’ve always wanted to collaborate with. He did Bread and Puppet theatre so I knew that he had the skills, and he came in and collaborated with the cast and [they] had a lot of say in what the puppets would look like, and they helped to create these puppets out of, basically, a pile of junk, and now they look like a scary monster. The set (by Taylor Andrews) is basically a D&D game life-size so, again, for people who have played it they’ll come in and instantly recognize the world that we are living in.”
Wilcox also highlights the fact that this play features Queer youth on stage, saying “I think it’s still rare, unfortunately, to find Queer youth in scripts, and I’m so stoked to be representing that demographic on stage.” The matinee on Sunday, March 10th is in support of the Nova Scotia Youth Project and Halifax Pride.
Another fun aspect of the play is that it is set in 1995, and Wilcox has been having a blast teaching the Generation Zs all about the 1990s. “I was like, ‘Google Dave Matthews,’” laughs Wilcox, “Friends is actually mentioned in the show. I’ve been having such a great time choosing the music for the scene transitions. There’s too much. The design team, we just kept getting distracted in Tech, because we we’re like, ‘well which one do we want? Is it going to be Mariah Carey?’ There’s so many great songs to choose from! It’s pretty fun. There are lots of references to pop culture from the 90s, so that’s another insider joke; so, if you were growing up in the 90s and you’re watching this show, you will find some good laughs.”
She Kills Monsters opened March 6th, 2019 and runs at the Neptune Theatre Scotiabank Studio (1593 Argyle Street, Halifax) until Sunday, March 10th. For tickets CLICK HERE or call 902.429.7070 or toll-free at 1.800.565.7345 or visit The Box Office at 1593 Argyle Street.
You Can Follow Neptune Theatre School on Social Media: Facebook. Twitter. Instagram (@neptunetheatreschool). Or visit THEIR WEBSITE.
