The leading actors in Royal Bay secondary’s upcoming performance of Ash Girl share a common challenge; they both have to perform in roles that are nothing like their own personalities.
Neither Chantelle Potier (Ash Girl) nor Hunter Gantzert (Prince Amir) are naturally angry or upset people, but both will try their best to portray characters with which they share few traits.
The play is based on Cinderella, but stays truer to the original, darker story than the kiddy Walt Disney version, including a truly wicked stepmother and stepsisters.
The title character is mostly a sad and lonely victim, meaning Potier has had to work extra hard to ensure that she doesn’t bring that psyche into her day-to-day life.
“Getting into that mentality and not having it affect my life outside, and being able to leave the stage and have it not follow me ... it’s difficult,” she says.
Gantzert, who describes himself as a happy, friendly guy, has found it difficult to portray the rough-around-the-edges prince.
“Amir’s a very angry person. He’s coming from a war-torn country into a whole new world ... for me that was just difficult,” he says.
But that’s partly why theatre director Melissa Young put the pair in their respective roles, hoping it would bring out a new side in their abilities.
“When I cast I want to hook into what they do well but also challenge them,” Young says, adding praise for both of the leading actors’ versatility while developing in their respective roles.
The story is set in a mysterious forest filled with seven deadly monsters, all of which replicate the seven deadly sins.
In addition to the usual antagonists of her evil stepmother and stepsisters, Ash Girl must battle her own insecurities.
It’s this modern and, at times, psychological look at a well-known story that drew Young to choose the play.
“I wanted a play that was a challenge for my actors. The play presented the classic story but there’s also lots and lots of different layers to it, which give them lots of acting challenges,” Young explains.
All of the play’s actors are in the school’s senior acting group – better known as the Black Wing Theatre Company – a class that takes in students keen on performing.
Working alongside the performers are the production team, made up of students from Young’s theatre production class.
Potier and Gantzert, both in Grade 12, are young veterans of the acting scene.
Potier has been acting in plays since she was in Grade 5, while Gantzert has taken acting classes throughout high school and been under Young’s tutelage since Grade 10. He says acting has helped him fit in with a
new social group.
“All throughout school I was never the popular kid or the sporty kid, and then in Grade 9, I decided I was going to take drama and that’s just really where I found my people,” he says.
Potier isn’t sure what her future holds, but she knows she’d like to have acting be a part of it.
“I would like to have multiple careers and I think acting would be a good one to have as well.”
And as the young stars get ready to have the curtain raised on their three-night run, there’s little doubt which scenes will command some extra rehearsal time. For Potier, it’s the transition she’ll have to make from the poor, down on her luck Ash Girl to the sparkling, beautiful belle of the ball.
But for Gantzert, his challenge is much more physical in nature.
“There are very fast scene changes where I go off down stage right and within four lines I have to come back on up stage left. There are three of us that have to run all the way around the theatre to get back on stage to be there in time,” he laughs.
joel.tansey@goldstreamgazette.com