The theater department at Paschal High School is preparing its performance of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein for the 2024 UIL One-Act Play contest. 

According to the assistant director for the UIL performance, Mr. Clemmons, “The play is Mary Shelly’s process of writing the story, critiquing, and then regretting the creation of the monster.” 

“It’s a very modern feminist take on everything about it because a lot of things that got caught up at the time was Shelley being one of the 1st prominent female authors to get that much fame and start up the whole sci-fi genre.” Mr. Clemmons further explains.

Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin Shelley began writing “Frankenstein” when she was 18 years old, two years after she became pregnant with her first child, who was found deceased while breastfeeding. 

“Dream that my little baby came to life again; that it had only been cold, and that we rubbed it before the fire, and it lived,” Shelley wrote in her diary.

That event inspired the 1st of 4 allegories in the book. Since then, more children of hers with tragic endings inspired a fable, an epistolary novel, and an autobiography.

 “A chaos of literary fertility that left its very young author at pains to explain her “hideous progeny.” says The New Yorker

The retreat for the theater department got them ready for the long upcoming process of beating the best shows in Zone and further.

There are six possible levels of competition: Zone, District, Bi-Distrct, Area, Region, and State. If the play is chosen to continue, the theater department will have rehearsals and competitions until May.

Look out for any official announcements from @paschaltheatre Instagram, and after the cast is done with this whole project, they will be doing a public production. 

Wish them all luck!