By Cage Evinger

Running from Oct. 24 through Nov. 1, featuring the Bachelor of the Arts (BA) Theatre & Performance and the Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) Theatre Design/Technology students, the Conservatory of Theatre Arts presented their production of "10 Out of 12."

Written by Anne Washburn and directed by Attilio Rigotti, the show portrays a theatre troupe in the midst of arduous tech rehearsals ahead of a large premiere for a new show. 

With cast members performing as actors for the play inside the play, along with other cast members depicting tech crew members in the audience, alongside actual audience members, the show brings every person involved into the world of the play and the difficult trajectory this cast and crew find themselves heading toward.

Attilio Rigotti, the director, said how in past performances of this show, "some of the actors you saw here live were entirely recorded the whole time." 

For the Conservatory of Theatre Arts, Rigotti last directed Macbeth in March 2025, also featuring the works of BA Theatre & Performance and BFA Theatre Design/Technology students. 

Macbeth, written by William Shakespeare and featuring a new translation/adaptation by Migdalia Cruz, was a technologically immersive experience with cameras following the actors at all times, sending the feed to TV screens all over the theatre.

In this performance, every member of the audience was given a pair of headphones, with the actors' voices being sent directly to the audience's ears to immerse everyone into the production fully. He continued, saying, "I believe that this show has never been done fully, as we've done, with actors all here."

"It's hard to differentiate between the characters; I had to think about how these are going to be different," Wren Woodward-Aviles, who played Eva, an actress, spoke about what portraying a role as two different characters was like. "How do I make these look different?"

Ari Laurie, who portrayed the production stage manager, spoke similarly of their role. "I'm not a stage manager – I think a huge part of stage management is connecting with anybody and everybody on your team, and so I think it was really interesting," said Laurie. "I almost felt like I was so many different people to so many different people."

Laurie continued, mentioning more specifically their position being placed among the actors during the performance, saying how 'it was a really weird process, to try to connect with everybody. I felt very in the center of everybody all the time. I would look towards someone, and I had to look through people.'

"Because my character is really grumpy this whole time," said Eli Bettmann, who portrayed the light designer. "I think that deep down it's still just great to create something as a community." 

Upcoming productions from the Conservatory of Theatre Arts include "Not by Bed Alone" featuring the junior Acting Company 51, and "Mad Forest" featuring the senior Acting Company 50.