The San Marcos High School theater department is putting on a show to haunt the school forever. Opening May 4, The Addams Family will take to the San Marcos stage, a show of romance, comedy, and ghosts. Preparation for this show began in January and the actors started creating their characters. Senior Cosi Arthurs plays the renown woman of the house, Morticia Addams. Creating the character of Morticia has been done hundreds of times by many different actors. Cosi shared her process of making the character.

“I read the script multiple times,” said senior Cosi Arthurs. “Dialogue has a lot more cues than music does. I really rely on that for the storyline and character, then transfer that to the songs to make it continuous.”

Back in December the hit TV show, Wednesday, a series about the Addams family daughter, was released. In this show the iconic Wednesday dance emerged. While San Marcos’s musical does not have this exact dance, it certainly has its own strange choreography. Since the ensemble members all play ghosts, the dancing has a contorted fluidity about it. As another element of magic to the show, two students have been trained in aerial silks and will be performing acrobatics during the show. 

All of these unconventional components are headed by creative extraordinaire and theater director, Shannon Saleh. Under her leadership the theater department has created a reputation for having immersive shows. Last year in the spring musical, Little Shop of Horrors, the crew built platforms that went out into the audience. Student actors did their choreography on the side platforms as well as the stage, making the audience wrapped up in the show that much more. 

Since the musical has so many moving parts, being backstage is a whole other dance itself. Crew members work nonstop building set pieces, moving props around, and much more to make the show run smoothly. 

“There are a lot of things around there and you have to get out of the way all the time,” said sophomore Camille Tracy, who plays a flapper ghost in the ensemble. “It’s chaotic in a fun way.” 

This musical is certain to be chaotic in a fun way. Opening night is Thursday, May 4 at 7:00pm in the theater, followed by shows on the 5, 6, 11, 12, and 13 at 7:00 pm and a show on May 7 at 2:00 pm. 

Buy tickets here!