Juan Diego actors shine at state, regional competitions

Intermountain Catholic

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Juan Diego Catholic High School theater department performs "Medea," which proves to be award winning in both state and region competitions. Courtesy photo/JDCHS

DRAPER — The Juan Diego Catholic High School theater department received Best Ensemble in the medal round at the 3A state competition held at Stansbury High School April 11-12. They also placed first in One-Acts in 3A Region 10 at Wasatch High School March 18.

"We did very well," said Joe Crnich, Theatre Arts director. "The Best Ensemble is an award given to the cast that is the most cohesive and coordinated. "Medea" is a short, funny piece and we got a really great response from all the judges and the audience. The kids had a good time."

At the region competition each school performs one-acts, contemporary scenes, classic scenes and monologues. "We took first place in the one-act category for "Medea," and then almost every student qualified for the state competition," Crnich said.

Juan Diego performed "Medea," the version that Christopher Durang and Wendy Wasserstein wrote of the Greek comedy/tragedy, said Crnich. "The act is about 12 minutes and is very fun, silly and the kids did really well with it stylistically. We have a great chorus and they chant some funny, kind of absurd things."

Crnich is new to Juan Diego this year and started in January. He taught last year at the Salt Lake School for the Performing Arts as artistic director. Prior to that, he was at the DaVinci Academy in Ogden and at Ogden High School for 15 years. He graduated from the University of Florida with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in theater performance.

Crnich’s main goal is to expose his students to the creative processes of theater arts, he said. "I want them to know all aspects of creating a character, creating and producing a play, designing a set and costumes so they are focused on theater art itself as well as on acting," he said. "My secondary objective is to teach them about different acting styles, expose them to the literature of the plays, reading plays, theater history from Greeks to Shakespeare to Moliere to contemporary playwrights, young playwrights as well as some contemporary musicals and musical theater history."

Crnich would like the students to appreciate the art form as a whole.

"I want to empower the students to be whole theater artists as opposed to saying they are just a singer or a dancer or an actor, he said. "I want them to come away feeling good about themselves and feeling confident and have the skill set to think on their feet and work collaboratively with other people. The theater is very much a collaborative art form and students have to problem-solve and be able to think creatively. Students have to be able to work well with others and also have confidence to speak in front of other people, to express their opinions and to be able to communicate effectively."

The Juan Diego theater department closed "A Mid-Summer Nights Dream" this past weekend.

"The play went very well; we had great responses from the audience," Crnich said, adding that he was told Juan Diego previously had never performed a Shakespeare play. "It was their first bite of Shakespeare and they did a great job. I was very proud of the way they got the story and portrayed the comedy."