“Powerful art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comforted.”

When I decided to take the Laramie Project on, I knew it would be met with different perspectives. Those of us who experienced the tragic and heinous death of Matthew Shepard in the late 90’s had a lot of questions about who we were as a society and how we were currently treating those in the homosexual community.

Many warned me not to do this show in a high school setting. There is a continuing discussion of ‘what is appropriate cencorshio in high school this sure today and how much cencorshio is appropriate?’

I wanted to pick a theatrical piece that would challenge us socially, not just the students but the audience, their families. What I love so much about this show is that it truly is just interviews and responses. No one from the original Tectonic Theatre Project (the creators of this play) makes judgement on the interviewees. They allow the people of Laramie and those individuals involved in Matthew’s case to speak their minds, and simply place it in a performable format. I feel as though the students were also given this opportunity to look upon the characters without judgement, just merely vessels for the stories and recounts being told.

My hope with this show was that we could see the lack of humanity Matthew experienced, not only in parts of his life but also in his untimely death, and to maybe find the humanity he deserved...the humanity we all deserve as divinely-inspired creatures.