Students of the Bow Valley High School's advanced acting program gave their final performance of the one-act play "The Other Room" at the Mitford School/Cochrane Christian Academy, on June 8.

Six actors performed the play, directed by grade 11 student Kinley Roberts, with several other crew members playing crucial roles in the presentation.

Written by Ariadne Blayde, The Other Room is a compelling and sensitive glimpse into a unique and misunderstood mind, through a series of humourous and heartbreaking moments.

The play centres upon a character named Austin (portrayed by Mordred Sturgeon), a brilliant teenage astronomer who is autistic. Lily (Hannah Stickel) is his popular classmate who has an interest in astronomy.

A chance encounter after school leads to a growing connection between them. Austin's imagination, intelligence, and constant struggles to connect with the world are revealed in the form of four characters (Connor Presti, Landon Caufield, Sevinn Joshee, and Trinity Yaremichuk) representing his inner life. 

Kinley RobertsDirector Kinley Roberts introduces the play to students of Mitford/CCA.

For her directorial debut, Roberts sought a play that would create emotion and a feeling of change in people.

"So when I read this script, I fell in love with it and the characters. It may some people feel uncomfortable, it might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it has such a powerful message and it shouldn't be something that we turn away from.

"Picking something that is so powerful and dramatic and having these amazing actors put together this piece that creates all this emotion and awareness to such an important topic was important to me."

It was previously performed at Bow Valley High and was entered into the Alberta High School One Act Play Festival in Strathmore, where it competed against 21 other one-act plays. Last week, they performed it at Banded Peak School in Bragg Creek before the final performance this week.

She says the play evolved with every rehearsal and performance, including this last one. She provides an example.

"The part where she's up on the table dancing in a plane we added two weeks ago, so every single time we've added something new. We're changing how we're saying lines, based on audience reactions and things."

"I am looking forward to next year picking hopefully another super powerful play and putting it on again."

Only one of the actors involved is graduating this year.

"I think we're gonna have to find another one. To top this is going to be hard."