Bear River Theater’s production of I Never Saw Another Butterfly was not one to miss. From tragic sorrow to beautiful romance, the play is a heartfelt story about not being afraid, even in the face of great danger.

I Never Saw Another Butterfly is a collection of poems and artworks created by the children that lived in a concentration camp called Terezin. Friedl Dicker-Brandeis, an Austrian artist, taught secret art classes where children could express themselves through drawing and painting the things they were seeing and the things they wished for. 

The Bruin cast members have worked very hard since August in order to prepare for the play and the result was a marvelous performance. Opening night was November 7, and it was also performed on the 8, 9, 14, 15, and 16 of November.

The set consisted of a few rooms made of movable “brick” walls used for a Jewish home, a classroom, and a train station. The set was constructed well and there was clearly lots of work put into the painting and props used to convey their message. Throughout the play the stage crew moved stealthily across the stage between scenes to change the props, sets, and the soapboxes.

The costumes looked like mostly normal clothes that old people would wear nowadays, but I think that they were perfect for the play. Even though there aren’t many photographs from that time period, I think that theater did a great job at portraying the people affected during the Holocaust. Along with costumes, the makeup that the cast members wore made them look tired and old, which helped the story feel more real, like the children of Terezin had grown up too fast and were always so exhausted, which truly showed the grief those children faced. 

The lighting on the stage also affected the makeup that the actors wore. It added to the tired and sad look and after the play when the cast members were lined up outside to greet people, and the lighting was more natural, it looked very strange because they had lots of dark and grey colors. At one point in the play, there was meant to be Nazi aircrafts overhead, and the were two swirling spotlights making it seem very real. These spotlights joined sound effects of sirens and men yelling, which inflicted the fear in the audience that so many Jewish families faced every time they heard those sounds.

At the end of the play, when butterflies dropped from the ceiling and the image of yellow butterflies was projected on the cast members’ bodies in light, it was beautiful, and a dazzling way to end a play with such a heavy and important message. 

The actors in I Never Saw Another Butterfly performed a spectacular and moving play and it was definitely one for the Bear River Theater’s books.