Swampscott teens attend ‘Zombie Prom’

SWAMPSCOTT – When Claire Vaucher dreamed about her first high school prom as a little girl, she probably never pictured wearing a dress from the 1950s and taking a zombie as her date.Vaucher and her fellow Swampscott High School thespians promise that this year’s annual spring musical will be one to wake the dead with their production of the 1996 off-Broadway “Zombie Prom” opening at the school’s auditorium Thursday and running through Saturday.With prom season in full swing, the students didn’t have to reach too far to act out the anticipation of the event onstage. “It helped with the mood for it,” said junior Jared Solomon. “We are all excited for prom, so it’s easy to emulate.”This prom will get a retro makeover as the modern-day students play their 1950s counterparts at Enrico Fermi High. Junior Scott Walker dons a leather jacket and excessive quantities of hair gel to play class bad-boy Jonny, who crashes his motorcycle into a nuclear power plant in frustration that he can’t be together with love interest, Toffee, played by Vaucher, because of her parents refusal. Jonny returns a glowing green to win Vaucher’s heart and a date to the prom, but finds opposition in the principal and an advocate in a local news reporter trying to break the story.Solomon said the audience might find themselves connecting with the story on more than just a nostalgic level, with a message of equal rights and individuality, for zombies and otherwise. “It’s quirky, but you can understand it on a modern level,” said Solomon.The students have been working on the play since February. Though most are frequent performers on the high school’s theater circuit, it wasn’t a familiar story, compared to last year’s production of the popular 1970s musical, “Godspell.” Solomon, who plays the reporter, said, “I’m a huge theater buff, and I had never heard of it. This is something exciting and new.”The players agreed that the unusual choice made it fun for them to get into character. With no celebrities as a precedent, they built their characters from their own imaginations. Vaucher said that, as a result, “It feels like we are the original cast.”Director James Pearse said the play would usually be a challenge for a cast of teenagers because the script is almost entirely made of up of song. “We have a lot of strong singers from the chorus,” he said. “I felt like we had the group to do it this year, and they’ve done very well.”Kait Taylor can be reached at [email protected] You Go? WHAT: “Zombie Prom”WHEN: Thursday, Friday and Saturday, at 7 p.m.WHERE: Swampscott High School auditorium, 200 Essex St.TICKETS: $16 for adults and $10 for students.