“It’s fun, it’s funny, come see it,” Charles Zimmerman told me a few days before the Advanced Drama Show. I took his advice and saw 2nd period’s performance of “A Night of Theatrical Dysfunction.”

This hilarious show included selections from David Ives and Christopher Durang. The first piece, called “Variations on the Death of Trotsky” began with a man sitting at his desk with a pick-axe smashed in the back of his head. The scene consisted of Mr. Trotsky recounting the details of his death, periodically dying, and then being revived when a bell would ring. It sounds quite morbid, but in reality it was very comedic, executed excellently by senior, Kenny Staff and juniors, Amanda Evanns and Jordan Semanick.

The second scene of the show was called “Canker Sores and Other Distractions” in which a man named Martin meets his ex-wife of 10 years for a dinner to tell her that he wants to rekindle their marriage. While trying to talk about a rather serious subject, he is constantly interrupted by an obnoxious waiter who keeps forgetting their orders and intruding at just the wrong moment. Martin develops a canker sore and complains to his wife Prunella about how much it hurts. Prunella then gets something in her eye, and the couple begins arguing about their pain, until the whole situation eventually escalates into them storming out, reminded of why they divorced in the first place. Scott Smith, Anna Weidner, and Cristian Preciado did an excellent job of turning a scene of simple annoyance into a heated argument.

“Words Words Words” was the next scene and was an especially funny one. The premise was an experiment testing the theory that if you give a chimp a typewriter, it will eventually write Shakespeare. It takes a look into the minds of the chimps, who were played by Aidan Howard, Chloe Campbell, and Charles Zimmerman. The three were hysterical together, bagging on humans and arguing over what Hamlet is and how they should write it.

The next scene called “Sure Thing” was one of the most impressive. It presented the idea of how certain situations would play out if you just said one thing a little bit differently. It started with a man named Bill, played by Noah Hornick, approaching a woman named Betty, played by Zoe Croak, who was reading a novel at a table. Bill would say one line and Betty would respond negatively, then a bell would ring, and Bill would change the details of what he was saying until another variable came up, in which the process would repeat all over again. What was exceptionally impressive about this scene was the actors’ abilities to repeat the same line several times with just a slight change and not slip up once. Hornick did an especially good job at this, while still maintaining the funny personality of his character.

The next scene, “The Actor’s Nightmare,” featured Kodo Elder-Groebe playing a man named George Spelvin, who experiences every actor’s nightmare: having to play several different characters, not knowing your lines and not even knowing who you are. Elder-Groebe’s impressive performance consisted of perfect comedic timing and the most lines out of anyone in the whole show.

The final scene of the show was called “Medea”, a parody of Greek theatre. Medea was played by Katie Paniagua-Aguiar and she had a chorus of four people that would repeat everything she said in sync. It was a very funny take on the seriousness of Greek theatre. The whole show was very entertaining, professional and well worth seeing. The students’ talent clearly showed in the excellence of their performances.