On Friday, March 29th, The Drama Deck CNU made its first official theatrical debut on stage. The Drama Deck is a new club on campus created to give opportunities to students who are not normally cast in big CNU productions. The Drama Deck is made up of not only theater majors but of all kinds. Susan Pirnat, vice president of The Drama Deck, shared with The Captain’s Log that she was a part of the original group that decided to make The Drama Deck an official club. She said, “This [club] is for the people who don’t have theater experience.” 

For their debut as an official club, they performed Twisted: The Untold Story of a Royal Vizier. Twisted was produced by Lucy Dairman who also played Princess Jasmine. Dairman’s portrayal of Jasmine was phenomenal from the acting to her beautiful singing voice. Twisted is a play similar to fan favorite Disney movie Aladdin, however, in this version, Jafar is the good guy. Jafar, played by Ben Upbian, was trying to improve the kingdom and teach everyone to follow the “Golden Rule”. In trying to accomplish this goal he fell in love, lost the love of his life, and eventually became a gene yet was still able to be reunited with his one true love due to Princess Jasmine’s last wish. Kendra Primm who played Aladdin was able to keep the crowd involved as her character tried to seduce Princess Jasmine. Within this play, we see a very different side of Aladdin than what was originally told. Primm got the most attention during Aladdin’s song “Orphaned at 33.”

Aside from amazing performances from Upbian, Dariman, and Primm, there was never a dull moment when the kingdom’s guard, played by Justin Nordberg, came out onto the stage. Nordberg was a crowd favorite causing jolts of laughter anytime he was to step out onto the stage. When coming onto the stage he always brought bad news with him to deliver to Jafar. It was not the news that was hilarious but his delivery of the line and presence on stage.

The best part of this event was when all of the villains from popular television shows joined Jafar on stage singing “Twisted”. Fan favorites such as Ursula from The Little Mermaid, Scar from The Lion King, Captain Hook, Maleficent, and so on. 

Susan Pirnat also shared that The Drama Deck “plans to do a musical every spring and produce two one acts in the Fall either student written or purchased online.” According to Pirnat, this is not the last time we will hear from The Drama Deck and to stay on the lookout for upcoming shows.