IT WAS ANOTHER successful fall play as the Uni High thespians performed "The Diary of Anne Frank" Thursday through Saturday in the North Attic Playhouse.

Directed by fine arts teacher Barbara Ridenour, the somber true story about a young Jewish girl and her family hiding from the Nazis in World War II Amsterdam was a departure from the lighter fare Uni actors had performed recently. But they were more than up to the challenge, as is clear from the diary entries published here.

Last week three cast members — senior Michelle Gao, junior Lauren Piester, and sophomore Anna Gooler — took turns documenting the backstage hustle and bustle of tech week and opening night. Today they conclude their diary with reflections on the play experience as a whole.

ANNA GOOLER: ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU WANT TO ACT FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE

Anna Gooler played a Nazi officer. Gargoyle photo by Michelle Gao (click to enlarge)

On Saturday, I was finally able to relax. No classes, no five-hour rehearsal, and I didn't even have to be at school until 5:30 p.m.!

Wait, rewind. Going to school on a Saturday? That's a good thing?

Yes, compared to the rest of the week when I was at school for 13 hours every day.

Finally, Saturday evening was the last performance of "The Diary of Anne Frank." I was excited, because I knew it would be the best performance yet! Then, after the hard work of the play and the strike, we would have a superfun cast party.

Of course, I was sad, too. Most people in the cast are in a different grade and have no classes with me, a sophomore. Rehearsals and performances were the only times I could see them. I knew I would miss dressing up as a Nazi aide and throwing things around on stage.

But there wasn't much I could do about it, except make the show amazing. So I arrived and began putting massive amounts of gel into the men's hair. I sewed a star onto the fur coat of Mrs. Van Daan (Hannah Lake-Rayburn). I gave Mr. Van Daan (Ethan Stone) a mustache.

The two hours of the play went by so fast, I suddenly found myself organizing all the costumes into bags to be cleaned. Soon, I was staring at the empty North Attic, free of the risers, chairs, and tape on the floor. There were no longer orange flats set up, or furniture, or platforms.

The strike was completely done. The floor had been swept. The van was loaded to take props back to Krannert. The risers and chairs were set up in the South Attic again, ready for chorus on Monday.

We had taken so long to put together the show, and in a couple of hours we had taken apart the whole thing. It almost felt like we were betraying the play, destroying all of our hard work.

But it's really worth it when you think about it. We had so much fun putting everything together! Of course there were stressful times, but the excitement made that stress obsolete.

It may not seem logical to go through tech week and put so much work into something that will end in just three two-hour performances. Unless you've experienced it, you can't know what it's like.

And if you love theater as much as I do, bonding with the cast and feeling adrenaline as you enter the stage is enough to make you want to act for the rest of your life.

LAUREN PIESTER: STRESSFUL, TIME CONSUMING, BUT AN AMAZING EXPERIENCE

Lauren Piester (right) played Margot Frank, and Lor Sligar portrayed Edith Frank. Gargoyle photo by Sindha Agha (click to enlarge)

When we started working on "The Diary of Anne Frank," I absolutely hated it.

I've never liked the story. I wanted to be in it because I like being in plays. I like the people (most of the time). I like the feeling of being onstage.

But I hated the story of the play.

As we worked more on it, and as I went from being a Nazi to being one of the main characters, Margot Frank (Larissa Pittenger dropped out a week or so after auditions), I slowly started to realize that I actually liked it.

Rehearsals took up time. I was tired. I was stressed. I had trouble with homework. I missed out on things because I was working on the play. But even so, I came to really like it.

Reading the story is so different from seeing it onstage or acting in it. It's such a different experience.

After we had finished our first actual performance, I was jumping up and down and saying: "We only have to do it two more times! Yay!"

But by the end of our second performance, my sentiment had changed. I discovered that I was sad that we would only be performing this play one more time. I wanted to keep going.

I think most of it was the audience reaction. Things that I had never thought of as funny before were suddenly getting tons of laughs. Suspenseful parts were resulting in gasps, and I know some people were crying.

It really helped me act, actually. I heard or felt the audience reacting, even though I wasn't looking at them, and I tried harder than ever to really convey what was going on.

Closing night, as the Nazis came in, I was actually scared, because I was sitting up there, in the "attic," thinking about how the audience had no idea what was coming.

As we were being ushered out, tears actually started streaming down my face.

During Ethan Berl's (Mr. Frank's) monologue at the end, where all of the characters come back out and just stand there as he talks about their deaths, I had trouble not crying.

Then, when we came back out after it was all over, I hugged a couple people, and then had to retreat to the South Attic. This rush of emotions just came over me, as I realized not only that some of the people I had been expecting to be there weren't, but also that I would never be Margot again.

I never thought being in a play would affect my emotions this much.

Yeah, plays are stressful and they take up a lot of time, but they really can be amazing, and it can be the best feeling in the world to know that you just took part in something that can have such an effect on people's emotions.

MICHELLE GAO: A CHALLENGE THAT UNI THEATER MANAGED TO PULL OFF

Michelle Gao (left) played Miep Gies, and Sarah Lake-Rayburn was Anne Frank. Gargoyle photo by Sindha Agha (click to enlarge)

The rush of adrenaline that ran through my body after opening night was incredible.

I had left rehearsal the previous nights completely emotionally drained and exhausted, but as I told Erin Hayes after the play, “An audience makes everything, everything, EVERYTHING better!”

Friday night was better, and worse.

Since the play started at 7:30, our call time to be back at school was 5:30, whereas it had been 5 all the previous nights.

The traditional cast dinner at The Courier Café was a little disjointed, because we’d all been seated at different tables. It was hard keeping energy up before the show, and several people had individual crises.

But once the house lights were turned off, and the sound of rain permeated the North Attic, everything else was put aside.

Everyone slipped into character easily, seamlessly, and the energy level finally started to grow. The people onstage feed off the energy the people in the audience give — and as Lauren Piester said to me during intermission, “This is a really good audience tonight!”

Saturday night, though, was probably my favorite of all the performances. After the last bows, the feeling that went through the cast and crew was bittersweet and excited at the same time. It was the last night, and everything had to go perfectly. It had to.

The strike went surprisingly well, considering what a small cast we had — and fine arts head Rick Murphy wasn’t there to oversee putting the risers back in the South Attic.

Through trial and error, we finally got risers taken down and put back together, chairs stacked and unstacked, and borrowed props stuffed into the back of a purple van.

That being done, we headed off to the cast party, which was at junior Laura Voitik’s house. There, we played disjointed games of Mafia, played her family's piano, were somewhat intimidated by her two (very large) horses, and played with her dogs and cats.

Everyone joked and laughed, and I personally felt as if a weight had been lifted off of me.

Don’t get me wrong — I thought "Anne Frank" was a great show, and a challenge that Uni theater managed to pull off.

But tech week was more tiring than usual, because we would leave rehearsal every night feeling completely emotionally exhausted. After night after night of arguing, crying, and being depressed in general, everyone needed to relax.

So overall? “The Diary of Anne Frank” was dramatic, filled with tension, and sad. Was I apprehensive at first? Yes. But everyone involved rallied and came together, and made it a roaring success in the end.

On a lighter note: StudProd auditions!

Ethan Berl and Lor Sligar as the parents of Anne Frank. Gargoyle photo by Sindha Agha (click to enlarge)

CAST LIST: "THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK"

• Anne Frank: Sarah Lake-Rayburn
• Otto Frank: Ethan Berl
• Edith Frank: Lor Sligar
• Margot Frank: Lauren Piester
• Miep Gies: Michelle Gao
• Peter Van Daan: Dillon Price
• Mr. Kraler: Rob Diehl
• Mrs. Van Daan: Hannah Lake-Rayburn
• Mr. Van Daan: Ethan Stone
• Mr. Dussel: Zack Goldberg
• Nazi officers and Dutch collaborators: Will Erickson, Anna Gooler, Daniel McNamara, Tianna Pittenger, Laura Voitik
• Understudies: Will Erickson, Anna Gooler, Tianna Pittenger

DIRECTOR & CREW LIST: "THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK"

• Director: Barbara Ridenour
• Assistant director: Jen Goheen
• Production assistants: Anna Gooler, Tianna Pittenger, Laura Voitik
• Stage managers: Tianna Pittenger, Laura Voitik
• Costumes: Anna Gooler, Stephanie Overmier
• Understudies: Will Erickson, Anna Gooler, Tianna Pittenger
• Lighting design: Jen Goheen, Natsuki Nakamura, James Smith
• Sound: Dan Moses Schreier
• Additional sound: Laura Voitik, Michelle Gao, Lauren Piester
• Piano: Karen Han
• Voices: Jim Best, Richard Murphy, Adam Tiouririne
• Light board operators: Adam Joseph, James Smith
• Sound operator: Jamie Weiser
• Sound equipment: Greg Smith
• Projection: Micah Berman
• Poster design: Michelle Gao
• Program design: Anna Gooler, Lauren Piester
• Stage crew: Will Erickson, Anna Gooler, Adam Joseph, Daniel McNamara, Tianna Pittenger, Stefanie Senior, Laura Voitik
• Set crew: Ethan Berl, Rob Diehl, Will Erickson, Katherine Floess, Zack Goldberg, Anna Gooler, Cristina Gratton, Adam Joseph, Daniel McNamara, Natsuki Nakamura, Stephanie Overmier, Lauren Piester, Tianna Pittenger, Dillon Price, Serena Schatz, Stefanie Senior, Lor Sligar, James Smith, Lisa Sproat, Laura Voitik, Fiona Weingartner