I grew up watching John Hughes movies. The Breakfast Club,
Ferris Bueller, Sixteen Candles, Weird Science(probably his
most questionable film…) to name but a few. They were pretty cool,
especially to me in the 80's. Me and my brother and sister would
rent them out on VHS and watch them over and over, quoting the
lines and totally falling in love with the worlds that were peopled
by geeks, dweebs and losers.
I'd always felt that it was okay to be one of those guys in his
films. The characters were always troubled on the inside, but at
the end of the day they would still be okay. They would have grown
a little, the jocks would respect them a little more, and maybe to
the girls they wouldn't be so invisible anymore. The framework of
his storytelling and the metaphors he used for growing up seemed to
ring true to me. A little American, and a little sugary sweet, a
little too idealistic but nonetheless they struck a chord.
School Dancefor me was born out of the memory of what it
was like to be a teenager. What it was like to lose myself in
fantasy worlds, and find friends who would lose themselves in these
worlds too. Where you'd imagine you were someone tough, or someone
cool or maybe even someone confident. And while on the surface you
may have been obsessed with He Man and She Ra, Gremlins and Dr
Who, or even Molly Ringwald in those John Hughes films,
underneath it all you were really just trying to come to terms with
who you really were, and where you think you might belong in this
world.
Those big questions that seem to nag a little harder when you're
15, but still keep coming back to all of us at any age.
Matthew Whittet, Playwright and Performer
School Dance,
Wharf 1, 11 January - 3 February, 2013.
Feature: Nostalgic dreams
Date posted: 7 Sep 2012Author: STC