After seeing Avonworth High School’s “The Curious Savage” three separate times I can surely say that as a performer myself, I am extremely impressed with the hard work, dedication, and talent my peers have presented us with this year.
At the start of the performance, we are introduced to a display of mentally ill, committed patients at an upper-class MA mental institution known as The Cloisters. As an actor, it can be difficult to portray a character that suffers from a complicated or debilitated mental state, but both Avonworth’s casts hit the nail straight on the head. With very different interpretations of each character, the cast portrayed a comedic, yet still respectful depiction of 1950s mental patients.
Seniors Yasmin Lima and Zayla Zimmerly played the character Florence. Florence had lost a child earlier in her life and is now trauma-bonded to a toy baby doll that she believes is her son. Not many high school students have the maturity or emotional understanding that it takes to comprehend, let alone portray, the emotions a mother feels when they lose a child. Even so, Lima and Zimmerly blew me away with a touching representation of this dismal scenario.
Senior Bree Brown and JĂșnior Harmony Karwoski stared as the show’s leading ladies playing the widowed millionaire Mrs. Ethel Savage. Brown presented a very good theatrical presence and completed her final Avonworth fall play. Karwoski’s performance had the audience in pure laughter. Her comedic timing and quick-witted instinct brought the show to life.
AHS Theatre now turns its attention to musical auditions and eventually rehearsals before the March 2024 performances.