“I know who the murderer is … All of you!”

Clue, a whodunit film and well-known board game, got it’s own Oak Park High School spin and was put on as a virtual play by Thespian Society Troupe 6074. The play was directed by Class of 2014 alumnus Jordan Schneider and performed via Zoom on March 20. It was accessible for 24 hours after its live performance allowing anyone who missed the initial performance a chance to still watch it.

The play follows six guests who are invited to a dinner only to find out that they are being blackmailed by a man named Mr. Boddy. Mr. Boddy reveals to the six guests that they must kill Wadsworth, the butler, in order to end their blackmail and stop their secrets from getting out. Mr. Boddy ends up getting murdered instead and the night is then spent trying to figure out who murdered Mr. Boddy while more and more murders occur. 

“None of the actors were able to physically be in the same space together, yet the way the play is written is that almost all of the characters are onstage together for essentially the whole show. Thus, we staged the play in Gallery View to give the appearance that they were all “onstage” at the same time,” Schneider wrote to the Talon. 

Acting in front of a screen is different from acting on a stage in front of a crowd. For many acting in the play, it was their first time ever doing screen acting and it was an entirely new experience for them that they had to be able to adjust to. 

“You’re performing to a camera and have to stick within the confines of a frame, so you have to make sure your physicality and facial expressions are readable on a small screen versus being on a wide stage, which usually means you have to minimize certain things and maximize others,” Schneider wrote. 

As this was the second virtual play OPHS has done, there were many changes added to accommodate the new viewing experience. Having a virtual play allowed a wider audience to view the show since it was able to be viewed anytime in a 24-hour period after it initially aired. However, the virtual platform gave way to potential technical and wifi issues. 

“Obviously when you record, it doesn’t feel the same— people don’t get nervous and excited, and some funny mishaps and improv bits don’t come through like they would live. but we realized that this is a super long play and there’s so much latitude for internet problems, so it wasn’t worth it for us to give up all of this time and hard work from everyone if an issue occurred,” junior and assistant director/stage manager Ashley Sanft wrote to the Talon.

Many who acted in the play were happy with the outcome and their performances.

“It was fun when we knew it was actually our final performance because we were just glad to know it’d be the last time we had to do it so that just gave us a lot of energy. Except for someone’s audio echoing back we luckily didn’t have any horrible mishaps,” junior Garrett Wilson, who played Wadsworth, wrote to the Talon. 

Junior Dominic Land attended the virtual play and was amazed by how it was pulled off in a virtual format. 

“It was really cool how they did it because it was online but they were all still interacting with each other, they were passing things through the Zoom boxes which was really cool to see. They did a great job!” Land wrote to the Talon.

Despite virtual life being the new normal, many are excited to get back to in-person life. 

“I would do a virtual play again, especially, now that I know how to (haha), but I am really eager to get back to live performance and I believe the students are as well. There is no greater feeling than performing live onstage for an audience and there is also no greater feeling than being in the audience watching a live performance happen right before your very eyes,” Schneider wrote.