by Krystyn Bristol

This past weekend, the theatre arts department held it’s bi-annual One-Act festival in the Campus Inn Theater.

The show featured three published plays directed by theater students, and four student actors.

Theater veterans Daniela Bustamante and Carlos Morales co-directed the first two of the three one-acts, both published by Samuel French Inc.

Bustamante and Morales’ first one-act was “Spotlight”, written by Buddy Thomas. The storyline followed Gail (Zoe Lemos-Munguia) a young woman desperate for a lead role in her city’s rendition of the classic play “West Side Story. Her boyfriend, Brian (Gabriel Ortiz) brought laughs to the room with lack of appreciation and a whole lot of sarcasm towards Gail’s rants about life and theater. Their drunken roommate, Mickey (David Mitchell), pantomimed excessive consumption of liquor and limped around the stage and verbally attacked the antagonist of the plot, Karen (Bianca Casillas). As the most dramatic of the three plays, “Spotlight” set the deepest of tones for the night.

“Sweet Room”, written by Brandon Ramos featured sisters Hannah (Vanessa Enriquez) and Madeline (Hillary Stanley) who had their house to themselves on a weekend evening. Hannah had just gotten home from a date with Tom (Fernando Rivera) and narrated it to her younger sister Madeline, who watched as she and Tom reenacted the date in a corner of the stage. After sharing laughs about the oddity of the date, they decided to order pizza and woo the delivery boy, Martin (Giovanni Macias) with their charm. The plot deemed to portray the classic “monkey see, monkey do” idea as Madeline watched her sister attempt to seduce Martin. The content was somewhat serious but “Sweet Room” also made audiences chuckle with the humor within the script.

The final play of the show, titled “A Coupla Bimbos Sittin’ Around Talkin’”, written by Richard Veteran was produced with The Dramatic Publishing Company and directed by another theater veteran, Julianna Ojeda.

This production had the brightest and most colorful set of costumes and props along with an obnoxiously hilarious cast full of hairspray, tanning lotion, and New Jersey accents. In the opening scene, three friends, Linda (Emma Garcia), Nancy (Josephine Osegueda), and B.B. (Elizabeth Vega) soaked up the sun and prepared to go out with Nancy’s cousin, Tess (Paola Arellano). The drama occurred when Tess arrived in a turtleneck and dirty sneakers, and Nancy and friends were determined to beautify and “bimbo” her up before the night crept up on them. After filling the air in the room with hairspray and humorous words, the message was portrayed that women who focus on their appearance aren’t always as dumb as they look. The girls ended up impressing Tess with their knowledge of the Waterloo, Napoleon, and more, and closed the show with a bang.

As always, the display of overall talent was impressive in this semester’s one-act festival. The tech students, cast, directors and crew all showed obvious effort in executing a dramatic, charming show.