Bringing Aliens – the special effects heavy 1986 sci-fi horror film – to screen cost about $17 million. To bring Aliens to the stage, North Bergen High School didn’t really have the budget to put on an elaborate production. And yet, it did, and in the process, it seriously impressed the internet.
“Our performance of Alien really shows you can do so much with so little and as long as there is a passion there to do these things, they are possible,” Steven Defendini, the school’s art teacher and the play’s director, told BuzzFeed News. “We don’t have really any budget – we recycle everything, everything is repurposed and recycled 10 times over until we get the look we need.”
The entire production is a display of creativity. Defendini, along with six students, created the costumes, including four astronauts and two aliens, and the 15 sets, including the computer room, which was made of egg crate inserts. The team also hit up thrift stores and were extra vigilant on recycling nights. The play is the result of a year’s worth of hard work.
The cast, which is made up of many Latino students, has performed twice already, and they hope to be able to go on one more time.
In the meantime, people are completely geeking out about it. Check out some reactions below.
