After winning at the Pennsylvania International Thespian Society Festival at Central York High School, the cast of The 39 Steps was asked to perform at the national ITS Festival located in Lincoln, Nebraska.

The national ITS Festival will be held from June 22 to June 27.

At the PA ITS festival students from all over the state are brought together to bond over their love for theatre.

While at the festival, students can take classes with professionals, and each school has the chance to perform a few scenes or the entirety of their show.

Although performing just a few scenes from a production is a very exhilarating experience, five lucky schools have the chance to perform their whole show in front of all the other thespians on main stage every year. At the ITS Festival in 2014, Susquehannock High School was one of the five fortunate schools to perform their full show.

Senior Ethan Paules, who played the roles of Mr. Memory, Mr. Crofter, and Mrs. McGarrigle in the rendition of The 39 Steps, was very enthusiastic about this experience.

“Performing at the state festival was one of the greatest nights of my life. It was really cool and a lot of fun,” said Paules. “The energy was insane, so being able to be to have the chance to perform our show twice at the national festival [and state festival] is even more exciting. I can’t even imagine how great it will be.”

Paules is planning on attending nationals, and trusts that everyone will remember their parts for the months to come before the festival.

Junior Brooke Weber, who acted as Pamela Edwards in the play, was also very avid about making it to nationals.

“I was so happy and surprised that we…[won at the State ITS festival] because we worked really hard on the show,” said Weber. “[Performing at the ITS festival] was the most fun thing ever, and I was just really happy for all of the seniors who are graduating.”

Michelle Joyce, choreographer of the musicals at Susquehannock, is very proud of the The 39 Steps cast.

“I think…[going to the national ITS Festival is] wonderful and a great accomplishment since they only take very few schools from across the country,” said Joyce.

Now that Susquehannock has achieved the big landmark of going to nationals, Joyce says that she hopes the theatre will keep up with their winning streak.

“I’d like to see us win some awards regionally at the Encore Awards in April,” said Joyce.
  Many are eager to see what happens next with the theatre program and can’t wait to find out what the results are from main stage at the national ITS festival.