Two St. Aloysius seniors and their theater teacher have banded together to write their school’s Spring production, “Unwritten,” in an effort to put on a perfect finale. 

Director Dani Kay Thomas, St. Aloysius English and theater teacher, said this is her ninth show to direct and the fourth original show she’s been a part of at St. Aloysius.

“It’s hard for us, a school our size, to find a production we can do,” she said. “Many of the shows require live orchestration.”

Thomas said the decision to write an original performance was especially important this year to showcase the talent.

“I have a wonderful group of seniors, many of whom started in the seventh grade acting in the school play,” she said. “I thought they really deserved a great show so I could showcase them among many others.”

Thomas said she co-wrote the production with her son, John Tillman Thomas and Dixon Stone.

“They’re just so creative,” she said. “We just put our heads together.”

Thomas said the show is a semi-fictitious account of five high school seniors and their plans for the future.

“One of the seniors is left waiting on her mom, and she starts to daydream,” she said. “She goes into this dreamlike state, and she dreams about what her friends are doing, including herself.”

The bulk of the play is that students dream about her friends, Thomas said.

“She ends up penning the dream into a book, and that’s how we got the title,” she said. “The title of the book is ‘Unwritten.’”

Thomas said the play ends with the friends having a reunion and revealing what they actually did with their lives.

John Tillman Thomas said the trio started brainstorming

“I enjoy that stuff a lot,” he said. “I’ve thought about doing that one day for a career, film/theater.”

John Tillman said his and Dixon’s ideas in creating the production helped because it is based on the lives of seniors at the school.

“It’s interesting I think for theater,” he said. “It’s somewhat fiction, but it’s still based on reality, which isn’t something you see a lot.”

Dixon Stone said all of the writers contributed special skills in creating the production.

“I’m good at picturing things on the stage, John is good at dialogue, Ms. (Baker) is of course great at music and Mrs. Dani Kay is the big pictures,” he said. “Everyone has their own special job when it comes to pulling it all together.”

Stone said writing the production allowed them to incorporate exactly what they wanted.

“All the years we’ve said it would be cool if we got to do certain things, then you write it and you get to do exactly what you want to do,” he said. “We’re doing new stuff and old stuff and making it exactly how we want it.”

Vicki Baker, St. Aloysius band and choral director, helped coordinate the music for the production.

“We’re doing cover songs,” she said. “We’re actually singing it, so I have to teach the parts.”

Some of the songs performed are “Vogue” by Madonna, “Hakuna Matata” from The Lion King, “Chasing Pavements” by Adele and songs from Mary Poppins, High School Musical and Les Misérables.

The performance will be held April 29 and 30 at 7 p.m. at Parkside Playhouse, and there will be a matinée May 3 at 3 p.m.

Tickets are $12 and may be purchased at the door, at the school or online through the school’s website.