What is an actor’s nightmare? Depends on which actor you ask. To some, it’s forgetting lines. To others, it’s stage fright in front of an audience. To George Spelvin, it’s being mistaken for an actor in the first place. 

In the upcoming Little Theater play, “The Actor’s Nightmare,” George (played by junior Teddy Nielsen) finds himself backstage with no memory of how he got there. If that wasn’t confusing enough for George, everyone seems to be convinced that he is not an accountant, but instead the understudy of the main actor in the play–and he can’t seem to get a straight answer about what play it is, either. 

This one-act, 40-minute comedy, to run March 13 through 15, dances through scenes from famous plays with every character perfectly in tune with what’s happening onstage, all while George is struggling to remember any lines and trying to follow along even while the production changes before his very eyes. 

And George? “He has no clue what’s going on the entire time,” said senior Kai Boveri, who plays an actress who’s trying to keep the show going despite the chaos George is causing. “[Other actors] are constantly trying to pick up where he’s failing. And it’s really hard on [my character] as an actress to be like, ok the show must go on.”  

This comedy is written by noted comedic playwright Christopher Durang and directed by Linda Burns, a history teacher at OPRF who’s been directing since 2005 at the high school and has been involved in numerous productions. Originally her plan was to do a different play, but those plans shifted after auditions. “We just didn’t have enough kids,” Burns explained. “I had five fantastic actors come out, and I’m like, they are perfect for this play that I never normally would be able to do because it only has five characters, and it’s one of my favorite plays…And [so I] chose the play for these actors.” 

“It’s really unlike anything I’ve ever done before”, Nielsen said. “Creating spoofs of plays that people know and completely making them different as you have a person that doesn’t know any of their lines, I think it’s really cool to do a piece of work and alter it in that way.”