Hitting the stage in "Outer Space"
By Joe Barron
Staff Writer

The aliens landed at Spring Field Middle School this week.

Some came to conquer the Earth. Others planned to abduct human beings for nefarious purposes known only to themselves.

And some were just looking for a quiet vacation spot.

In the end, they all learned to get along with the earthlings and, as often happens in science fiction, the planet was saved.

This scenario took shape through the collaboration of twenty two children ages seven to eleven who attended the summer theatre camp sponsored by the Springfield department of Parks and Recreation.

Counselors Alex Emmert and Jackie Knox, both entertainment professionals with Encore Entertainment’s Creative Theatre Group, led their charges through games and exercises designed to acclimate them to appearing on stage.

Then, beginning with only the title of the show - “It Came From Outer Space” - the children devised their own plot in a series of brain storming sessions. After a week of whirlwind rehearsals, the half hour show was scheduled for performance Friday afternoon.

The only limit Knox and Emmert placed on the children’s creativity was a rule that the resolution of the interplanetary conflict had to be none violent.

The children created their own characters as well. The girls tended toward portrayals of cats and queens, while the boys seemed to prefer playing robots and intergalactic conquerors. “Space is the draw for the boys,” Knox said at Tuesday’s camp. “They see space ships, they see aliens, they get excited.”

James DeFelice of Flourtown played a ravenous robot called Skull-Eyes. Tyler Adams transformed himself in a combination robot and bullet train, and Scott Vierick of Erdenheim portrayed and interplanetary emperor with seven galaxies under his thumb and his greedy eyes on the Milky Way.

“Eight is his lucky number,” Vierick said.

Lizzie Eastman chose to play a green alien cat, and Shannon Doyle said she would be an alien queen, though she added her character was not Vierick’s consort.

Gaby Giordano of Flourtown said she has a flare for playing snobs and her character in the show would be a snobby alien. “I’m really good at that” she said.

By Tuesday, the children already had a good idea how the play would end. The Earth’s salvation would depend, in large measure, on a virus that induces the would-be conquerors and kidnappers to dance the hokey pokey.

“It writes itself,” Knox said.

After a day and a half of planning and pantomime games, the children took to the stage Tuesday afternoon for their first blocking session. With twenty two characters and only a half hour of playing time, each actor would have only a minute or two in which to shine.

Emmert said he did not think anyone would have trouble remembering what he or she was supposed to do. Another counselor from Encore, Kim Burghart, recorded rehearsals with a video camera and interviewed each of the campers in close up.

Burghart said she was preparing a souvenir videodisk for the children and their parents, complete with the sort of extras included on Hollywood DVDs.

In a few weeks, cast members could sit down with a bowl of popcorn and enjoy “It Came from Outer Space,” the directors cut, with boxed, running commentary by their fellow stars.