Sex scandals involving adults and youths. They are in the news far too much these days. But how well do we understand them, especially from the youth’s point of view? That’s the basic question explored in the 2006 play “Speech and Debate”, currently being presented by the Secret Rose Theatre in North Hollywood, which we saw last night.

Speech and Debate tells the story of three teens at North Salem High School in Salem, Oregon: Solomon (Simon Daniel Lees), an enterprising reporter and pro-life Democrat who wants to investigate sex scandal of the conservative mayor who has just been discovered frequenting gay.com; Howie (Matt Strunin), a gay teen who cruises gay chatrooms, and just made a connection with the Drama teacher at North Salem; and Diwata (Tiffany Jordan), an online blogger and high-school drama nerd with a grudge against the Drama teacher and a desire to form a speech and debate club. A podcast by Diwata hinting at sexual misbehavior by the drama teacher brings Howie out of the woodwork with his incident, and Solomon’s investigation of his story then brings him to Howie. This, in turn, all brings them to Diwata’s Speech and Debate club-a-bornin’. Whereas Diwata sees this club as the opportunity to perform the musical version of The Crucible that she wrote, it provides the framing device for the students to slowly tell their stories as Diwata works to convince them to participate. I’m not going to spoil the specifics, but suffice it to say that each of these students has sexual secrets to be revealed, and the desire to keep them hidden forms a bond between the three and propels the story to an interesting climax.

Each of the three principal cast members were very very good. As Diwata, Tiffany Jordan created an obsessed drama nerd: obsessed, that is, with Mary Warren of The Crucible and all the roles in high school musicals that she didn’t get. In fact, Warren and The Crucible are almost an additional character in the piece, raising the question of how much of the persecution seen these days are just witch trials fueled by hysteria and the desire for revenge. Jordan inhabited this character, capturing the craziness and the obsession and the burning desire to tell the story, as well as having a great singing voice. Instigating the investigations was Simon Daniel Lees as the seemingly straight-laced Solomon: Lees captured the repressed nature of this character well: you could see how he was obsessed with the story he was investigating, but you couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t give it up. The third character in the triangle, Howie, was played by Matt Strunin, who did a great job of capturing the sensitive nature of this young man who came out at the age of 9 (well, 10) in Portland OR, and is now in the more repressed community of Salem. As the show went on, you could see through Strunin’s portrayal how Howie became more confident in himself and who he was. Rounding out the cast was Nina Donato as the Teacher/Reporter.

The production was directed by Jon Cortez, who did an excellent job of bringing out these characters and making them realistic. Choreography (for this was a play with music and movement) was by Crystal Castillo. The set (designed by Mike Rademaekers, Jay Bienenfeld, and Jon Cortez) provided the basic school setting with, with alcoves on the side to represent student bedrooms. Jason Henderson’s lighting did a good job of illuminating the mood without distracting. A key centerpiece of the production were the video interstitials and the intrepretation presentation: the main video production was by Jason Henderson, with the interpretation presentation by Matt Strunin. Sound recording was by Simon Daniel Lees. Illustrations were by Ryan Fabian. Hallie Baran and Danielle DeMasters were the stage managers, assisted by Jason Henderson.

“Speech and Debate” continues at the Secret Rose Theatre through August 22.

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I saw the show last friday night with friends, and we all enjoyed it a lot. Speech & Debate is like a Modern-day Breakfast Club, with 3 misfits who are forced to work together to bring down a perceived injustice, or possible sexual indiscretion of a teacher at their school in which one or more of them may be involved. I thought the three young actors playing Diwata, Howie and Solomon were genuinely funny and real, and another actress played both the teacher and a reporter and was great. I liked the play a lot, and it had a lot to say about what kinds of things teenagers deal with now, from gay internet chatrooms, Teen pregnancy rumors and speculation, and worrying too much about what others think of you. There is a great dance number and a couple songs, although I wouldn't call it a musical exactly. The theater was easy to find and there are a couple great restaurants down the street. We went to Pit Fire. A fun and inexpensive night out!

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A few students (must of been friends of the cast) laughed. The rest of us were bored. Unfortunately, no intermission so we were stuck!!!!!!!!Two hous of torture! No aircondition or fan. Hot as hell! The reviews that liked the play must have gotten high before the play.

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Had there been an intermission, we would have walked out. Theater was also cold.

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