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The Student News Site of Millard West High School

The Catalyst
The Student News Site of Millard West High School

The Catalyst
The Student News Site of Millard West High School

The Catalyst
Jean Valjean, played by Caleb Hauser, rips up his parole documents, changes his name, and starts a new life. This photograph is heavily edited from everything to the background to the paper shreddings and is not an accurate representation of the set onstage.

Do you hear the people sing?

Luka Pashia
November 22, 2024
On stage, Juliet’s actor Lily Lane and Romeo’s actor Henry Hudson talk and flirt at Juliet’s balcony. At the Aug. 29 performance, the cast and crew had rehearsed this play many times already, with the hopes of portraying a heartfelt story, this was their first time performing for a packed theater. “Stay but a little, I will come again,” Lane (Juliet) said. “Three words, dear Romeo, and good night indeed.”

Bravo, star-crossed lovers

Luka Pashia
September 16, 2024
Mr. Green, a character notorious for his anxiety and germaphobia, played by Brykin Jones, is shown shocked and disgusted as two ‘dead’ bodies lay next to him.

Clue premieres with a full house

Valerie Pioppi, Staff Reporter
December 5, 2022
Photo Courtesy of @theater_mw on Instagram

A seat in the director’s chair

Bowie Zekpa, Staff Reporter
November 14, 2022

LegallyBlonde takes the stage

Ariana Griffin, Catalyst Online Editor-in-Chief
October 27, 2022
"Clue" will hit the stage at the beginning of December

Mysteries on stage

Bowie Zekpa, Staff Reporter
October 24, 2022
Theater director Brooke Phillips presents the Creative Arts Network to theater teachers at the International Thespian Festival at Indiana University- Bloomington. "I'm excited to be a part of the project," Phillips said. "This spring we'll be recruiting more teachers to join our individual Professional Learning Communities, so it made me really excited and proud to share what we are doing with this project, and then recruit other teachers to be in my group this spring."

Preparing students for success

Paige Hightower, Staff Reporter
September 9, 2022
Projecting their voices, students from a dozen schools across the state spread awareness of the importance of theater. When advocating for theater, the students fight for every thespian in Nebraska to have equal funds to support their theater programs. “We met with our state senators to recognize theater as an important part of education, ” junior Isaiah Helenthal said. “ I contacted my senator and we asked to make an appointment to talk about theater, also how it affects us in hopes they recognize how impactful it can be, to students' lives, and the importance of theater education.”

Funding for the arts

Zianya Salgado, Staff Reporter
March 4, 2022
Performing “Disney's Descendants: the Musical” junior Sadie Kottich and her fellow cast members gather around the auditorium’s center stage to begin their performance. After spending weeks preparing, they were reading now more than ever for their moment of showtime. “Getting to perform on stage is truly an unforgettable expierence,” Kottich said. "After getting past the nerves, I was really just excited for everybody to see what we worked so hard on.”

A thespian like no other

Quinn Burton, Staff Reporter
December 9, 2021
The musical’s cast members gather around the auditorium’s center stage to begin their performance. After spending weeks preparing they were reading now more than ever for their moment of showtime. “This was a really exciting experience getting to be in front of a crowd again,” sophomore Mars Zekpa said. “Having past experience performing in front of large crowds made it not really scary or nerve-racking. I was really just focused on getting to show everyone what we worked so hard on.”

A memorable performance

Quinn Burton, Staff Reporter
November 11, 2021
This is the group picture of the Theatre department attending the festival last year.

Tweaking theater traditions

Jasmine Hermosillo-Padilla, Editor-in-Chief Catalyst Online
December 18, 2020
In order to reduce the risk of COVID-19 spreading, the Theater Department decided to livestream the play for people to watch on Striv. Audience members were invited to watch the show from their homes. “The biggest challenge was making it accessible to the audience,” director Brooke Phillips said. “We couldn't have people come in person so we streamed it live and setting that all up for the first time was really tricky. I picked this play because it is about a family escaping world wide disasters over and over. Humans have survived wars, floods, dinosaurs, an ice age. I wanted people to feel like we could survive this crazy pandemic.”

A production abridged

Anna Blumenthal, Entertainment Editor
December 9, 2020
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