BRHS Drama took to the stage in regional Class B (schools with fewer than 500 students) competition at the Maine Drama Festival’s regional One Acts tournament held at Camden Hills Regional High School, Friday, March 6, with their hilarious production of Jonathan Rand’s “Check, Please!” with permission from Boiled Sweets, LLC. Senior Matthew Little and sophomore Olivia Carlson received All Festival Cast Acting Awards and the entire cast received a Special Commendation for Physical Comedy.

Rand’s comedy is touted as one of the most popular one-act plays in the world, having been performed over 30,000 times, in 72 countries, translated into a dozen languages. The plot is simple. Two characters Boy (Lee Pangburn) and Girl (Kora McKenney) navigate a seemingly endless array of horrific blind dates with truly absurd characters before finding each other. The entire play unfolds in one restaurant, the laughs keep the pace fast. Director Dr. Mary Miller was granted permission from the playwright to select the funniest scenes from Rand’s extension plays, “Take 2,” and “Take 3,” to create a condensed, side-splittingly funny show.

Little and Carlson were outstanding; eerie, rude, neurotic messes in each of their vignettes as the blind dates. Little played Sports Fan who was unable to pull himself away from the game during the date, and an overly needy, super-clingy, rudely handsy Frenchman, and Mark, a man who shows up for the date wearing only a burlap sack (don’t worry, it’s Versace), and Liam, a widower who shows up with his invisible friend (in this case a puppet). “We changed the script for Sports Fan to make him a Miami Dolphins fan, because I am a Dolphins fan. The original script called for a Chicago Bears fan,” said Little. Little has participated in the drama festival each year of high school. In 2023, he delivered a standout performance in Rachel Barter and Grace Campbell’s “The Census Taker” (based on a poem by Robert Frost), in 2024 he helped the club bring home silver for Kai Pitcher’s “The Final Chapter” and in 2025 he helped the team bring home gold in regional competition, silver in state competition as Theseus in William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” His versatility in each of his four roles in the latest production required a disciplined approach. “I started studying each role from a broad perspective; the nightmares of modern dating. Then, I drilled down to these characters specifically until I found the right voice for each. From there, it was a matter of matching them to the right gestures,” said Little. It worked. Little walked away with an All Festival Cast Acting Award, as did Carlson.

This was Carlson’s second All Festival Cast Acting Award, after receiving one in 2025’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” for her role as Fairy. “Last year’s award came from a non-speaking role; I have a speech impediment, and this year I have a lot of speaking parts. I’ve gotten better, working hard to practice pronunciation,” said Carlson, whose role as Phoebe was simply triumphant. Phoebe is characterized by her extreme pickiness and slew of irrational fears, including a fear of dampness (hygrophobia), the color purple (porphyrophobia), and constipation (coprastasophobia). Carlson used notecards and videos of herself speaking the lead-in line to practice the timing and delivery of her lines. She shouts out to Addie Barter for helping her practice the pronunciation of her character’s litany of phobias. Equally impressive, Carlson played Pearl, a kleptomaniac, Sophie, a woman in her 80s dating 20-somethings, barely able to navigate her walker through the restaurant, and her showstopping role, Mimi, a mime. Boy got out of his date with Mimi by telling her that a glass box has descended from the sky, thus trapping the mime. “I watched several mime videos, and just started doing the actions,” said Carlson. “The hardest part of that role was putting on mime makeup backstage in the dark. I went on stage not really knowing what I looked like.”

As many as 26 actors are often used when staging the play, but BRHS’s small cast managed to pull off the rapid-fire dating rounds with only six. While Pangburn and Kora McKenney stayed in their respective characters, Little and Carlson each played four roles and Jayden Coulombe played an amazing five. Coulombe’s range was impeccable. He played Louis, a self-absorbed, socially awkward eccentric Capricorn whose mustache wouldn’t stay affixed, a crusty Pirate who takes the bread basket and leaves, a man who discovers his blind date is his actually his cousin (after they hit it off well), a gay man who’s on a date with a woman because he’s researching his role in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” and a man who is ready to plan his wedding and name their children while on their first date. John Cooper, new to BRHS Drama, played a waiter who witnessed all the dates. He’s a natural on stage, providing immense physical comedy to the scenes. His future in the club is exciting.

Guided by Stage Director Susie Taylor, the play could not have come together without Autumn Therrien and Kolton McKenney, working fast backstage to usher the actors through 12 costume and prop changes in under three minutes each time. Maya Rhys Jacobs, who cut her teeth in the club’s production of "Frozen" earlier this year, was on lights and Chloe Joneth was on sound.

Festival winners included first place, Class B to Searsport District High School for “The Waterspout” (adapted by Goosman) and Class A to Oceanside High School for “The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane” (adapted by Hartford from the book by DiCamillo). Each school will advance to state competition. The festival, sponsored by Maine Principals’ Association and Maine Drama Council, hosts regional competitions with winners advancing to state-level competitions. Winners from the state-level competitions advance to the New England Theater Festival.

The annual event includes about 80 schools, more than 2,000 high school students, to encourage high school theater and giving dedicated young performers the opportunity to see the best work of others who have the same passion for the stage. Judges for the regional competition were Justin Ramos, Tricia A. Hobbs and Lynda Neubelt. Festival Host, Kailey Smith. Assistant to Host, Heidi Kopishke. Festival Technical Director, Tom Heath. MPA Drama Committee, Jesse Bartke. MDC Representative, Tom Heath. Student Tech Support, Quin Smith, Natalie Clark, Alden Zimmerman, Wylie Hixson, Maggie O’Brien and Izzy Pease-Fountaine, with special thanks to Jane Self, Matthew Kopishke, school custodial staff, community volunteers, and student hosts, and Food Service, Mikael Andersson and the Wave Café staff.