GIRLS VS. BOYS

Love. It’s been danced, sung and acted out in a million different ways on a million different stages, over and over again. But not like this. GIRLS VS. BOYS, presented by the American Music Theatre Project and the House Theatre of Chicago at Northwestern University’s Wallis Theater, brings the dangerous game of love to the stage with violence, passion, nudity and a lot of the f-word. In short, all of the crazy things that love puts us through in real life. I love it.

GIRLS VS. BOYS is the story of siblings, Casey and Sam, at a new school of moody, curious and sexually charged students. The school kids are thrown into chaos after a couple’s breakup and from there, Casey, Sam and their classmates are thrust into what is always referred to as “the game.” This is the love game. To these characters, the opposite gender is the enemy and sex is the means to victory. Relationships, including one blossoming between Casey and Lane; one ruined and lingering between Lane and Krueger; and one attempted between Kate and Casey, are hyper-charged with emotion – love that doesn’t just hurt, but kills those involved if it goes awry. The girls come to loath and lust after boys (while the boys are excited and hurt by girls) and life is only a matter of staying alive amongst the emotional violence. The characters are each navigating “the game” of love, sex and sexuality in their own way, but with confusion and fear of growing up that is universally familiar.

GIRLS VS. BOYS was developed through a collaboration between Northwestern University theater students, The American Music Theatre Project and The House Theatre of Chicago. Director, Nathan Allen, led a master course in Theatrical Storytelling at Northwestern last winter, and his students devised the fiery original work that is GIRLS VS. BOYS. The music was loud and provocative, rife with not-so-subtle sexuality and the lighting was powerfully colorful. There’s a rap song and a ballet scene. But my favorite thing about the show was the raw emotions displayed by the actors. I usually prefer movie characters, which seem more multi-faceted and realistic than stage characters, but the intensity of different feelings of lust, self-loathing and desperation brought to the show by GIRLS VS. BOYS were just too accurate. The audience can watch each character learn a valuable lesson about forgiveness, self-reliance or identity, and feel their pain (or elation) as they do. I think it is undeniable that everyone, regardless of age or experience, can appreciate and understand the honest emotions flying across the stage here. And, boy, do they fly.

GIRLS VS. BOYS runs at the 2009 Summer Music Theatre Festival at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois through August 2nd. The show will also go on – as part of The House Theatre’s upcoming 2009/2010 season. Click here for tickets.