CSI’s Production of “Everybody” premiered April 7, 8, 9

By: Carlos Glick

On April 7, 8, 9, the College of Staten Island’s Drama Department had their production of “Everybody” by Brandon Jacob-Jenkins and might I say, it was amazing! 

According to sightlinesmag.com “Everybody” is Jacob-Jenkins’ adaptation of the 15^th century morality play, “Everyman” and follows an archetypal person as they wrestle with Death who has recently called them to die. The lottery, we are told by an overly helpful Usher, is meant to more closely thematize the randomness of death. 

“Everybody” was not what I was expecting at all. I realized throughout the play that it tackles different emotions/circumstances. In a way, we are seeing a deep, dark play right in front of our eyes.  

I loved the way Jacob-Jenkins wrote it and how Professor Maurya Wickstrom, a professor in the Performing and Creative Arts Department, located in 1P, directed it and brought the text to life. 

The premise of the play is quite interesting and makes you think/ponder a lot. It messes with emotions, dreams and just life itself. In other words, it’s a representation of life.

I was confused at first when I saw the play, but as it went on, I figured it out. 

There are a handful of different characters in this play including Everybody, Friendship, Kinship, Cousin, Stuff, Evil, Strength, Beauty, Senses, Mind, Usher, God, Understanding, Love, Time and Little Girl. 

“Everybody” is a show we can all relate to. We all experience these different emotions and encounter people with these traits. 

“Everybody” can be related to the real world. Why, yes, we do have friendships and experience people with these different traits and personalities. 

The actual play itself is quite remarkable. To even think that Jacob-Jenkon’s would even consider writing a play that interprets everyone and everything we go through in life is so cool.

He is quite a genius himself. 

I had the opportunity to interview Christian Martinez, a Junior here at CSI, who is a Drama major, and was in the play “Everybody.”

Martinez, who plays the character Death, has this to say. “Being part of such an amazing cast and crew was definitely my favorite part about being in “Everybody” because everyone brought something great to the table with their amazing talent, positive and honest mindsets.”

Martinez continues by saying, “I would also say I learned how to act with numerous people on the stage at once and not just me, but someone else. Having the whole cast with me, giving them all attention and working with all of them was really cool and pretty challenging, but that was definitely a good learning experience.”

“Everybody” makes you think about your own life. It makes you think about the friendships you encounter, the situations we all face now and in the future, and how to encounter them all. 

What’s cool about this show is the dream sequences the character Everybody has. It was so cool how that played out on screen. It was like we were in a completely different world.

The dream sequences kind of reminded me of the movie “The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl” which stars Taylor Lautner as Sharkboy and Taylor Dooley as Lavagirl. This also reminds me of the movie “Inception” which stars Leonardo DiCarpio and Joseph Gorden-Levitt.

If you haven’t seen the school’s production of “Everybody,” but want to, don’t worry, you’ll have the opportunity to. Being a film major, I had the opportunity to film one of the performances. If you hadn’t had the chance to see one of the performances, but would like to, you can email me at carlos.glick@cix.csi.cuny.edu