Last Friday, Southampton College welcomed students from eight Long Island high schools to attend the Young American Writers Project show. Indeed, this year again, the writing program was a real success.
Writers Patricia S. Follert and Victor Giannnini came for twelve school days into Mr. Dorskind’s creative writing class. Each student had to write a one-act play and share it with the class. At the end, one play was selected in each school. Augusta Greenbaum’s was chosen to represent WHB.
“My play is about mistaken identities, and how people judge each other based on what they look like. I wanted to make people aware of this society issue by making them laugh.”
Augusta’s play, “Maid in the USA,” and the nine other shows had the chance to be performed twice, once on Friday for the students, and once the next night for the public. Some WHB students were actively present in the production of the show. As the writer of the play, Augusta Greenbaum had an important influence on the final result.
Sophomore Christie Moyle played the part of Madeline Morris, and Senior Gina Arfi played Rosita Santiago-Mendez, a rich Spanish heiress, who just arrived to America.
Rosemary Cline, a director and actress, was part of the process during the whole week before the show. She helped Christie and Gina to get right into the part.
I was the Assistant director myself, and junior Maria Sanchez was part of the stage crew.
Being part of the production of a show is very instructive. This program is an excellent way to develop creative and writing skills and to discover careers.
”Through this experience, I learned a lot about the format of a play. You can’t only write a long monolog, you need to make it interesting for your audience. It really confirmed my choice to study English,” said Augusta Greenbaum.