Dustin Staggs

NWA Democrat-Gazette

If you walked into rehearsal for the Don Tyson School of Innovation’s performance of “Silent Sky,” you would see a stage alive with movement — not just from the actors, but from every student involved in the production. While some paint and construct — even working a circular saw — others put together costumes or practice their lines, all under the supervision of director Seth Biazo.

The energy is no doubt concentrated, the dedication is unrelenting, and there is very little goofing off for a group of high schoolers. Ask any one of these devoted young thespians, and they’ll tell you this performance is a passion project of theirs.

Lauren Gunderson’s “Silent Sky” relates the tale of Henrietta Swan Leavitt, an astronomer who worked at Harvard in the early 1900s to measure the cosmos. Leavitt’s discovery of the link between Cepheid stars and their brightness enabled scientists to compute cosmic distances, expanding what we know about astronomy, according to the Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian. She died before realizing the full impact of her discovery. However, her narrative is about more than just science; it is about ambition, determination and the battle to be acknowledged in a man’s world. Today, over 100 years after her death, experts finally acknowledge the value of her contributions to astronomy.

Biazo was eager to bring “Silent Sky” to his students. He found the script a couple of years ago because he wanted to do a great set design just for practice, he says. He had even made a cardboard model before DTSOI theater instructor Kevin Cohea announced intentions to present the play. When he and Biazo shared the script with the kids, they immediately fell in love with it.

Casting is always hard, especially when it’s a cast of five, Biazo says, and he and Cohea had 30 kids audition for the parts. But it was senior Italia Cruz who knew the part of Leavitt through and through. Like Biazo, Cruz had read the script for the simple pleasure of it and fell in love with the character and the real person that was Henrietta Swan Leavitt.

The passion Leavitt had for what she did, along with her determination and her internal struggles, is what drew Cruz to the role.

“For me, this show is just passion, passion, passion,” Cruz says. “If you really love something and you want to do it, you have to do it with everything you’ve got. That’s something that my parents have taught me for so long.”

“Enthusiasm, especially in high school theater, goes a long way,” Biazo says. “Italia read the script so many times and fell in love with it and understood it.

“I just love the way they portrayed Henrietta also,” he adds. “That’s how I see Henrietta.”

Together, Biazo and his students found the overarching theme within Gunderson’s story that they want to drive home with their iteration of “Silent Sky” — finding one’s place not just in the universe, but also in society and inside oneself. The performances are meant to seem personal, reflecting the confined working conditions of Leavitt and her fellow female astronomers.

“We really want to honor the real people this story talks about,” says Biazo.

The theater students have had no time to spare. They received their scripts in December, and they only had access to the performing arts center the last week of January to start putting together the set.

During rehearsal on Feb. 6, junior Nora Greenslade, the scenic director, paints and decorates a wall flat with the shade of green she picked out herself. Senior Brian Pittman, the stage manager, keeps the rehearsal running smoothly, helping out Biazo with directions and hopping in to fill in parts for a student that is absent donating blood.

In addition to Cruz, making up the cast are senior Dayanna Pena as Williamina Fleming, senior Charles Merryman as Peter Shaw, junior Sarah Karp as Margaret Leavitt and junior Katelyn Travis as Annie Cannon.

Biazo has been driving home with each of the kids the mentality of enjoying every moment of the process.

“I want to focus on us all being together, looking each other in the face, enjoying the process, because a lot of these are seniors, and in a couple [of] months they’re going to graduate,” he explains. “I don’t want to just blink and it’s done.”

It’s a notion that resonates within the script of “Silent Sky” — being present, appreciating the work and acknowledging the passing nature of time.

“That’s the bummer about theater,” Biazo adds. “You put all this work into it, and then one day we tear it all down.”

But for the time being, the students of Don Tyson’s Theatre Department are creating something they’re passionate about, and by the time the lights go up on opening night, they will have already gone for the stars.

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FAQ

‘Silent Sky’

WHEN — 6:30 p.m. Feb. 27-March 1

WHERE — Don Tyson School of Innovation, Pat Ellison Performing Arts Center, 2667 Hylton Road, Springdale

COST — $5-$10

INFO — soipac.ludus.com/index.php?show_id=200473536