LIBERTY — Nearly 3,000 students across 22 elementary schools and seven school districts will travel to the Pickens County Performing Arts Center (PCPAC) in Liberty over the next two weeks to see “Something Very Fishy.”
In addition, home school students are travelling from as far as Greenville to see the production.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization released an analysis in 2017 that describes a grim fate for the world’s coral reefs: by the year 2050, all of the planet’s reef systems will have died off if society doesn’t act now to curb climate change, a fact that has motivated Clemson University associate professor of biological sciences Michael Childress and graduate students Kylie Smith and Kara Noonan in their research over the past eight years.
Starting Jan. 30, they are bringing this critical information to the masses with the help of local playwright and award-winning songwriter Kathy Prosser of Educational Entertainment LLC, who has written an interactive family-friendly play about marine conservation geared toward elementary school-aged children.
Prosser’s play follows Sandy Carson, “an enthusiastic but somewhat naïve science major,” Prosser says, in her quest to study the issues facing our oceans, such as acidifying waters, overfishing, and pollution. In contrast, the antagonist, a fisherman named Mr. Stu Pidder, is exploiting the ocean’s resources and creating more problems for the environment.
Through a cast of marine characters, the story highlights how what we do above the surface impacts life below.
Following the production, students will venture into a backstage area that has been transformed to feel like they are underwater, where they will have the opportunity to interact with marine life up close. Professor Childress will provide 35 Clemson students and ten science performing arts exhibitions including almost 200 live marine interactive touch tanks.
One public performance is scheduled for Saturday, Feb. 9 at 10 AM. Generally admission tickets are $15 and can be purchased online at pcpac.org or at the box office the day of the show.
