| Stupid Kids | |
| Characters: | Judy Noonan Jim Stark John "Neechee" Crawford Jane "Kimberly" Willis |
| Place: | Century Center for the Performing Arts New York City |
| Orig Lang: | English |
Stupid Kids is a play by John C. Russell (1963–1994),[1] first published by Dramatists Play Service, Inc. of New York,[2] and first performed in 1991. Very similar in tone, plot, and characters to the film Rebel Without a Cause, the play follows four students at Joe McCarthy High.[3]
Subsequent to its New York run, it played in Seattle and Boston.
Jim has a crush on Judy and Judy's boyfriend Buzz is a popular jock. After a police raid on a rave, Jim makes friends with Neechee (a fey kid who has nicknamed himself after Nietzsche) while Judy befriends punkish riot grrrl Kimberly. As Jim and Judy pursue each other through the unpleasant social procedures of high school, abandoning their rebellious nature in favor of comfortable conformity, Neechee and Kimberly fall unhappily in love with them—Neechee with Jim, Kimberly with Judy. Ultimately, their experience alienates them even further from the mainstream, and from the objects of their affection.