By GARRETT SAGER
Hays Post
ELLIS — Ellis High School will take to the stage this weekend with “They Run in Our Family,” a play arranged by Heur Publishing that is being put on by the EHS Art Department Friday and Saturday at the EHS Auditorium.
The play is from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., counting the intermission. Tickets, available at the door, are $3 for K-12 students and $5 for adults and tickets will be made .
The play is a comedy the whole family can enjoy, according to Alyssa Dawson, who was the theater director last year at EHS.
This year’s play is being directed by Sam Polifka.
Dawson said there are many EHS student-athletes in the play, which is a love letter from the art department to the athletics program.
Synopsis from Heur Publishing:
They run in the Pennywinner family and how! They run, they jog, they do push ups, and they all do their part to make the Pennywinner residence a veritable gymnasium. All, that is, except Mom and Peggy who insist that life cannot revolve around athletics just because Dad coaches the Central High Frogs. He coaches football in the fall, basketball in the winter, track in the spring, baseball in the summer, then, as Mom laments, “We start the vicious circle all over again.” Dad—Coach Sam—lives and breathes sports 24 hours a day; daughter Pat, aspires to be a wrestling champ; son Buzz, is about to start in his first football game for the Frogs; and son Alvin, lives to wear a Frog jersey. Dad’s football teams have lost 25 straight and play arch-rival Northview on Friday night. As the big game approaches, pressure and pandemonium mount. The Northview Nomad attack is led by Alexander the Great, who, it’s learned, is a member of the Northview team. Dad assumes he’s a spy and decides to fight fire with fire. The fire he chooses is Pat, who is to have her first date ever, with Alexander. By the end of the second act (1), it’s discovered that Alexander is a member of the Northview the DEBATE team; (2), Spook is tackled by the porch swing and lost for the game; (3), Buzz is derailed with a virus; and (4), doom and gloom reign as Dad submits his letter of resignation. Ultimately, it’s Peggy herself who hilariously manages to save the day – and the game – as she and Mom finally decide “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em!”