Valencia High School drama students, under the guidance of Sarah Anne Sumpolec,
workshop an early draft of the vignette Faces, April, 2026.

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Why this play?

The play started as the ten minute ghost story Ashes, which premiered at Art in Motion Theatre in Thornlie, Western Australia, with the US premiere at Anchorage East High School in Alaska. While that play works well as a ten minute piece, I always felt that there was so much going on with the five protagonists that I wanted to see more of them. I toyed with expanding the play to a full length for a while, before deciding that the best way to keep the impact of that piece was to tie it into a larger world, but keep it as its own story...hence a vignette play! (I've always wanted to write one!)

The play takes place on the last night before school begins, when five high school students gather deep in the woods to roast marshmallows and swap spooky stories around a crackling campfire. But as they weave their tales, the stories reveal more about their own buried fears, dangerous secrets, and hidden truths. Before the night is over, they discover they aren't just telling ghost stories—they’re in one.

The 2024 production of Ashes at Alcovy High School in Conyers, GA, the final vignette of the play.

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Sample Dialogue...

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The play is available from YouthPLAYS.com