Students from Wayne High School had a unique opportunity this past weekend as they performed their school play, 12 Angry Jurors, not in an auditorium but in the Allen County Courthouse.
Wayne High School revived its theater program last year with You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown. But this year, they decided to do things a little differently.
Due to construction, the school’s auditorium wouldn’t be able to host a fall play this year. But that wasn’t going to stop theater director and business teacher Mell Depew from ensuring the show would go on.
“So, I knew coming into the fall that we weren’t gonna have a theater," she said. "So, I had to think of a show that could be nomadic, cause I knew we were gonna have to take it somewhere, whether it was the cafeteria or maybe to do a different school.”
Depew’s husband is on court security at the courthouse and Depew said it was his supervisor's idea to hold the play in the courthouse rotunda.
12 Angry Jurors, or traditionally 12 Angry Men, is about a group of jurors trying to decide the fate of a boy accused of killing his father. Depew said the play is about so much more than a legal process.
“So it’s about human flaw and trauma and the power of persuasion," she said. "And what better place than, well, where we are, right here?”
Depew said she knew cost could be a barrier, but the Allen County Sheriff’s Department told her if she could get court security to volunteer their time, they would allow them to do so. Depew said this option cut costs dramatically.
From there, it was all about fundraising.
“We were able to fundraise through a juror chair campaign, we had a car wash that was really successful," she said. "We had the students out just asking people. Partners in Autism donated $500 to us. So, we’ve just been very, very thankful that the community has come together to allow us this opportunity to be here.”
As written, the play takes place entirely in one room, needing only a few set pieces – a table, a door, a window – making it an easy play to move between buildings without losing any of the charm.
The original version of 12 Angry Men premiered as a teleplay in 1954. Depew said, aside from just the name adjustment, students worked to modernize their characters.
"We all have inner trauma that affects our decision making, right?" She said. "So, we decided to set this show in modern time, okay? So, I had the students take some time, once they know which character that they were playing, to create an entire backstory about them and to find how they connected to that character in some way.”
Briar Brown is a senior at Wayne and played Juror Number Two, a nervous crowd-follower whose vote changes several times over the course of the play, as they follow whichever person is making the best argument or has the most authority.
Brown joined the play a little late, picking up the role after another student had dropped out. But they still took the time to find their character’s motivation.
“My first thought was; Why? Why does my character feel this way, what has brought them to this point and how do those backstories and those personality traits manifest in ways that I can bring to the stage that are not necessarily written into the script?” Brown said.
Brown created a character who lacked parental guidance in their youth, and seeks it out in other authority figures in their adulthood. Brown also said they imagined Juror Two as neurodivergent with a sensitivity to loud sounds. This gave Brown the opportunity to be reactive during part of the play where other characters were shouting or slamming their hands on the table.
Brown said 12 Angry Jurors stands out because it is a play that focuses so heavily on emotional moments through conversations and how characters react when they’re not the one speaking.
“You really get to see those individual personalities that are created by the actors themselves really shine through those moments," they said.
Putting on a play about the civic process of a jury trial inside of Allen County’s historic courthouse lended to the gravitas of the story, said Brown, who hadn’t been inside the courthouse since a fifth grade field trip.
“I love the architecture and the internal design of this place and being able to put it on in such a regal and amazing setting instead of a school cafeteria, for example, is such a stunning and amazing experience," they said. "It really makes you feel like you’re doing something really important.”
Renting the courthouse for events goes through the Allen County Courthouse Preservation Trust, so none of the judges or courthouse officials had anything to do with the play. But Allen Superior Court Chief Judge Jennifer DeGroote said continuing to put on stories like 12 Angry Jurors can offer a unique insight into that system.
“We have this general sense of ‘well you’re gonna have a right to a trial by jury,’ but what does that look like?" she said. "And there’s very little information really other than through maybe movies and things like this where people can see it, because what happens in a jury room you never get to see.”
One student in the play admits they knew very little about jury trials before beginning rehearsals. Wayne sophomore Abby Engquist played Juror Number Four. She said before this, she didn’t know the foreman was elected, or really that there even was a foreman.
“They don’t really teach you that in school, you know?" Engquist said. "I’m learning a whole bunch of new things through this play just like about our country in general.”
DeGroote said she hopes students are able to take away what makes the jury process so integral to our judicial system.
“Hopefully this teaches them something about, you know, impressing upon them it’s so very important," she said. "It’s also a very unique system in that most jury trials that take place around the world happen here in our country.”
Wayne High School’s theater department tripled its number of students from last year, Depew said.
“We have some really talented kids," she said. "They’ve made me cry in rehearsal because they’re just so immensely talented.”
