There's a lot of paper involved in Wednesday's premiere of "HOME ... A Work in Progress" at the Lensic Performing Arts Center.
Talking about paper, fretting about words on paper and literally watching it rain from the sky.
That's because Joey Chavez's Santa Fe High theater students have put together an original production focusing on the 896-page manuscript of the main character, Ruben, an Española Valley native.
Ruben has come to New York City seeking fame and fortune for his novel, and life is not exactly delivering what he had planned.
"I made Ruben into a wacky, failed writer with not very much self-confidence," said Willie Collier, 18, who plays the part. "He's prone to accidents too."
The latter is a bit autobiographical, as Collier explains that the gauze around his wrist and third finger hides 17 stitches.
"I was trying to open a window," he said, sighing.
Collier, like the other theater students, feels lucky to be working with Chavez, who acted on the same stage at Santa Fe High before graduating in 1975. After studying theater at the University of New Mexico and receiving a master's degree from the University of Oklahoma, Chavez acted with the Alliance Theatre Company in Atlanta for seven years.
Then he moved to the Big Apple, where he was a company member of the Open Eye Theatre and a playwright at the Public Theater.
"You know that he's talking what he knows," Collier said of Chavez. "He's not making stuff up— he knows the finer points of acting."
'Time to come home'
Chavez, a 12th-generation New Mexican, returned to New Mexico in 1995 with his wife to raise their son here.
"I had accomplished so many things I'd never dreamed of," Chavez said. "I had all my union cards and performed all over the country. It was just time to come home."
He's taught for 13 years at Santa Fe High, keeping a 16-page short story that he wrote in 1994 tucked away. Last fall, Chavez decided to rewrite the short story as a play for the Performing Arts for Student Success program with Santa Fe Public Schools.
The first day of the second semester, Chavez read the story to his Drama III class, telling students they would use the basic plot line and structure and expand the story into a play about an hour in length.
"We spent the next two weeks improving scenarios and situations from the short story," Chavez said. "I would take notes and have the students turn in cards with snippets of dialogue or sentences."
The next week, Chavez wrote the first draft of "HOME"— about 33 pages.
"We rehearsed the play for 10 hours before taking it to the 2008 Theatre Festival at Eastern New Mexico University" on Feb. 21, Chavez said.
The audience of some 600 students from around the state responded overwhelmingly positively, Chavez said, and offered suggestions too.
Four days later, "we wrote out the plot line on a piece of paper which was 3 feet by 12 feet long," Chavez said. "We also discussed where we needed to fill holes and flesh out characters and situation."
Cast members wrote their ideas on a large piece of paper on the wall, then improvised scenes while Chavez took notes.
On March 3, Chavez handed out the new script, which had grown to 43 pages. But after reading it aloud, the students still felt something was missing, so Chavez added another scene. A week later, the final draft was ready.
Added value
Chavez's play has been the instrument for more than just motivating his drama students. Amy Summa, who runs the PASS program for Santa Fe Public Schools, said that besides offering sixth-grade teachers two daytime performances of the play for their students, PASS is also offering pre- and post-performance workshops for sixth-grade classes.
"Joey does not dumb down his performances for anybody," Summa said. "He has high expectations of his actors and his audience. The kids really appreciate that respect."
A few weeks ago, Chavez offered a workshop for the sixth-grade teachers on how to prepare their students for seeing the play and how to integrate it with their ongoing classroom work.
PASS also worked Chavez's play into its theater artists-in-the-classroom program. Theater artists Charles Gamble and three other actors went into various classrooms and talked with students about their experiences of home.
"A surprising number of kids in these sixth-grade classes have moved a lot of times," Gamble said. "I had one student who had moved 12 times between different states, different houses."
In one exercise, Gamble had students make lists: reasons to stay home, reasons to leave home.
"We use those to prompt them to improvise a scene," Gamble said, "say with a grandson telling his grandmother, 'I'm leaving to go to a big city and become a basketball star.' ''
In the post-performance workshops, Gamble said he may do something with "letters home," an element in Chavez's play.
Gamble talked about how the main character Ruben feels his presence hasn't had any impact in New York, "when, in fact, he has— through the pages of his novel that end up affecting these other strangers in the city." The pages of the novel end up lying here and there in the streets, and passersby feel moved by what they read.
"And through his personal contact with other city dwellers, we see his presence has registered on them," Gamble said.
It's not unlike the impact a teacher has on students.
"I feel lucky to have him as a teacher," Janos Waller, 17, said of Chavez. Waller plays Eddie Martinez, the main character in Ruben's novel. "He's known by everyone for being a great teacher."
If You Go
WHAT: "HOME ... A Work in Progress," an original play by Santa Fe High drama teacher Joey Chavez and his theater students
WHEN: 7 p.m. Wednesday
WHERE: Lensic Performing Arts Center, 225 W. San Francisco St.
HOW MUCH: All seats are $5. Tickets are available at the door or by calling the Lensic box office at 988-1234.
