Theater students have been rehearsing and advertising their SpongeBob Musical for months. The play was set to run Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, however, an injury to lead, senior Ella Lewis, has caused the musical to be moved back to Jan. 16.

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“No one knew what was wrong with me, I was in excruciating pain, and my costar Riziki Kimani who plays Sandy fell down [from the scaffolding] with me and was fine,” Lewis said. “She was already up on the scaffolding before, but when I climbed up to join her it collapsed, and we fell six feet. Riziki landed on her wrist which ended up being fine in a couple of days, but I fell on my chest and spine which ended up not being fine.”

After considering other options, the theatre department decided it would be best to reschedule the play.

“We could have just thrown a student in there with a script, but decided that our audience deserves a great show,” technical theatre director Laura Darce said. “We also don’t want a student to have to experience being unprepared on stage.”

Usually, during such an incident, an understudy fills in, but the lack of student turnout became an issue.

“Ultimately, we thought that we’d have a ton of students interested in performing in this show, but didn’t have a huge turnout,” Darce said. “We probably should have had an understudy, but we did not anticipate this issue with our lead actor.” 

In the meantime, an understudy for Lewis has been found in case the lead isn’t able to perform come January.

“An underclassman has now stepped in the role of understudy, which is going to be an amazing opportunity for her,” Darce said. “When showtime comes, if our actress [Lewis] is unable to perform, we have a great alternate. Additionally, we’ve decided to give our understudy the Saturday performance, no matter what, so her hard work pays off.”

Despite the obstacle, cast members, such as senior Kenna Hall, think the musical can run smoothly with more time.

“But what I’m thinking might just happen is, since we pretty much have it [the musical] blocked and everything, there’s really nothing else we need to do other than just run [it],” Hall said. “So I think that it’s just going to be running and running and making sure everything is perfect by the time [of the musical].”

Even with the hardships Lewis is enduring, the experience taught her a valuable lesson.

“This experience has taught me that I can’t please everyone,” Lewis said. “Sometimes things can’t happen when I want them to.”