Good Grief! CHS Student Play Up for Regional Awards!

Clackamas High School senior Jared Beideck will never forget the first time he was truly bitten by the acting bug—the thrill of performing in front of others, the loud applause immediately jolting his self-esteem, and perhaps most importantly, his family members beaming with pride from the audience.

“It was technically in third grade in Mrs. Santilli’s class at Spring Mountain Elementary,” laughed the energetic 18-year-old. “I was the lead in a class play about how Portland got its name. I still remember I played Francis Pettygrove, a founder who wanted to name the city ‘Portland’ when others wanted to name it ‘Oregon City.’ My memorable line was, ‘No, it’s Portland.’'”

To the delight of performing arts fans both at Clackamas High and across the Portland area, Beideck has been uttering memorable lines on stage ever since. The always upbeat character actor started with one singing line in Annie (“I used to throw away the papers!” he sang aloud during a recent interview), to playing The Lizard in A Year With Frog & Toad (“That was a fun one!”), to The Genie in Aladdin (“Maybe my most favorite role ever”), to The Donkey in Shrek, to The Beast in Beauty & The Beast.

“Something that I love about acting is getting into the headspace of the character and finding out the whys and the whats. The Beast was really fun because how the heck do you get into the head of a monster? There was a lot to work with there and it was a challenge.”

But Beideck certainly doesn’t back away from challenges, especially during his most recent role not only as an actor, but also director, producer, set designer, fundraiser, and even production company founder just to bring his all-time favorite play to the CHS stage.

While in middle school, Beideck starred as the title character in You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown produced by Imagine Theatre, a local youth production company. Imagine’s version included Charlie Brown with his familiar Peanuts gang of Lucy, Sally, Linus, Schroeder, and Snoopy, along with groups of young singers and dancers in the background. But Beideck couldn’t stop thinking about how uniquely powerful the show could be if scaled down to only the six speaking characters.

“I adored the idea of just six people. I was imagining how tight-knit the cast would be and how much you could portray with just working closely with five other people, but there’s no way a high school would do it because there are only six actors.”

Beideck began to believe his dream production would never hit the stage, until his theater teacher came up with a simple suggestion—why not just produce the play himself?

“At first I just laughed,” remembered the ambitious actor. “But then I was like, yeah, I guess I could. So I started looking into how that would work and put together a cast of six close friends and started fundraising and coming up with so many ideas. It was just so exciting.”

But just like Charlie Brown infamously trying to kick a football before Lucy suddenly pulls it away, Beideck found his production flailing before it ever kicked off. The rights to

perform You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown were very expensive, and could only be purchased by theater companies—not eager high school thespians.

“And that’s when I was like, OK, I just have to make my own. So my mom and I created an LLC and we got me signed on as a co-owner, so everything worked out legally, and I used our fundraising money to buy the rights.”

With the rights secured, the new co-owner of “Playhouse Collective Theater Company” used the rest of his donated dollars to purchase set pieces found on Facebook from as far away as Salem and even Florence on the Oregon coast. Within a week, Beideck and his supportive family loaded up a rental truck and hauled everything from Snoopy’s doghouse to an oversized couch back to Clackamas High, where drama teacher Tyler Oser helped his student book the school’s performance auditorium.

“It was kind of amazing to watch a student of his age look at a passion project and say, ‘I want to produce something by myself from start to finish,’” said Oser. “If anybody in our program was going to have the gusto, the want, and the perseverance to see the project through, it would be Jared.”

Five of the six actors, along with all the behind-the-scenes crew members, were either current or former NCSD students. Beideck was filled with emotion when the curtain rose for the first time.

“I was nervous, but when the lights hit and we started performing, it was everything that I wanted it to be. I was just so happy that I didn’t have to be nervous or anxious anymore. People paid money to see me put together something awesome and I didn’t want it to fall short.  Everything went exactly how I wanted. It was pure bliss.”

And just like every great performance has an encore…so does this story.  Within weeks, Beideck and his castmates learned they had been nominated by broadwayworld.com, a national website covering stage productions at all levels, for three regional awards—including Best Ensemble For Young Audiences Production.

“It’s so awesome for our first show out of the gate,” said Beideck, who played the lispy Linus in his own production. “And you’re with these crazy big-name theaters who have been in the industry for decades.  We were winning the best youth theater category in the first couple weeks, so go vote online!”

Even if Beideck’s You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown doesn’t win any regional awards, the curtain is just starting to rise on the aspiring actor’s young career.   

“I’ve applied to a whole list of colleges for musical theater or for acting, so we’ll see what happens,” he added optimistically. “I definitely want to be on Broadway, that’s my hope. You know, in the heart of New York City where you get thousands of people in hundreds of theaters every single night. That would be incredible to be performing for those people, giving them the joy that they paid to see, that’s what I want.”

And to think it all started when an eight-year-old Jared Beideck uttered his one big line in a third-grade class play. Maybe someday he’ll answer celebrity interviewers about where he’s from…New York? Los Angeles?

“No, it’s Portland.” He knows that line well.