| Bang Bang Dead | |
| Premiere: | April 7, 1999 |
| Orig Lang: | English |
| Subject: | School violence |
Bang Bang You're Dead is a 1999 one-act play written by William Mastrosimone. Inspired by the Thurston High School shooting, the play follows a high school shooter who is tormented in his jail cell by apparitions of the five classmates he killed. A film adaptation, also written by Mastrosimone was released in 2002; it depicts a high school production of the play where one of the actors struggles to avoid becoming a shooter like the play's lead character.
Mastrosimone stresses the importance of young people seeing the play performed by their peers, and therefore he does not allow the play to be on film or video. Mastrosimone hopes to reach out to potential killers in the thousands of audiences that the play continues to gather.
Bang, Bang, You're Dead! was written in the wake of three school shootings: Thurston High School (Springfield, Oregon) on May 21, 1998, Heath High School (Paducah, Kentucky) on December 4, 1997, and Westside Middle School (Jonesboro, Arkansas) on March 23, 1998. The names of the cities in which these shootings took place are echoed multiple times within the script.
The tragedy most significant to the play was the shooting at Thurston High School. The play, based strongly on the events that surrounded this particular school shooting, premiered at Thurston. It was performed by Thurston students, some of whom had been wounded in the shooting by Kip Kinkel.[1]
Mastrosimone wrote the first draft while troubled by a recent event at his son's school, in which an anonymous classmate of his son wrote a message on a chalkboard, threatening to kill his classmates and his teacher.[2]
"Bang Bang You're Dead" was performed at Fringe NYC 2013 by students from the Actors Playground School of Theatre, and members of their theater company, Playground Theatre Project, from August 9 through 25th. Directed by Ralph Colombino and Dan Cooley, and assisted by Rich Palmros and Stage Manager Gianna Marino, the show was greeted with much praise, led by the performances of Ed Squires and Taylor Rogers, in the lead role of Josh, Ryan Shapiro, Summer Russo, James Garlock, Gracemarie Loretta, and Caroline Palsi.[3]
Bang, Bang, You're Dead, was first performed in April 1999 at the very spot that inspired it: Thurston High School in Springfield, Oregon.[4]
The première of Bang, Bang, You're Dead was met with some criticism and controversy as well as praise and even endorsement. Some locals, including Dennis Murphy, the fire chief of Springfield at the time, were hostile towards the production at first. Many thought that Mastrosimone was using the recent tragedies to "cash in." The play was immediately endorsed by the Ribbon of Promise, a group dedicated to nonviolence in schools, formed in Springfield after the shooting.[2]
All five actors act as a chorus, coloring Josh's would-be monologues. They also are the rumors in school and the voices in the dark that haunt Josh.