Agosto Villalva (12) had just gotten into a car crash, his family was in a time where they were financially struggling, and he had just turned 17 leaving him only one year left in childhood. It was a lot to process. He said he felt as though he needed to do something, find something to help him let out all of his emotions.

 He needed to write. 

He hadn’t before, but in this moment he said he felt as though it was the only way to expel his hurt, anger, and frustration. 

“I’m not sure what clicked, I just remember sitting down and deciding to write about my family and the things I’ve noticed and learned as I’ve grown up,” Villalva said.

These writings eventually formed into Villalva’s first One Act, This Must be the Place.  

One Acts is a production put on each year by Westview Theatre Company (WTC) to provide an opportunity for writers at Westview to express themselves and hone their script-writing skills. Writers may submit a script  which is then formulated into a one act play by members of WTC. 

Villalva has been a part of WTC for the last three years. He served as lighting coordinator for this fall’s production of The Three Musketeers, and more recently as stage manager for Beauty and the Beast. 

This year Villalva has written a one act once again with I’m Alive, I’m Dead, I’m Greg. The play follows three recently deceased souls as they figure out how they want to spend their afterlives while simultaneously reconciling with their pasts on Earth. 

Villalva began writing I’m Alive, I’m Dead, I’m Greg almost immediately after finishing This Must be the Place a year ago. Over the course of the following year, he has spent hours writing, rewriting and editing the blossoming script.   

“I’ve matured with the script,” Villalva said. “It was able to grow up with me, and I think that helped me figure out what the script is really about—how your perceptions change over time to make the world less black and white.”

Villalva also attributes his maturation as a writer to his time in Writing Seminar, taught by Bob McHeffey. In that class, Villalva was given an environment to experiment with different styles to help find his voice. McHeffey also worked with him one-on-one to tighten the script and form his own distinct writing voice.

“[McHeffey] helped me at a time when I didn’t know what more I could have done with the script,” Villalva said. “He showed me how to not waste an audience’s time and shave some of the fat down to make the script to-the-point and fast-paced. His changes made me feel all the more confident in the script.” 

 Villalva’s writing process begins with ideas, ideas that often come from many forms and many sources of inspiration. But for I’m Alive, I’m Dead, I’m Greg the simple premise came out of nothing in particular save for the imagination of Villalva himself. 

“I recall writing a sentence down in my notes app,” Villalva said. “[It was] something about dead people having a conversation and it seemed interesting enough to give it a shot. And that’s where the last year of my life has gone.”

Once he had enough of these story bits, he began to formulate connections between them and write the first draft. The first draft is always rough, but necessary in the overall writing process 

 “My first draft is always the worst thing ever,  but that’s the point,” Villalva said. “You just have to kind of go with it. Soon, you begin to understand more about the characters and their struggles. Once that is there, the theme starts to bleed through and suddenly everything you are writing makes sense.”

As the rest of Rancho Peñasquitos slept, Villalva sat in front of his computer, conducting intervals of typing at his keyboard and pacing around his room thinking. He finds working between twelve and two a.m. to be the most productive for his process. These are his hours, the hours where the distractions of school, friends, and extracurriculars are voiceless. Only his mind, his hands, and the page are present.

“I think writing is supposed to be your bubble and your space,” Villalva said. “It’s important for every writer to be within themselves a lot, and being alone is a crucial part of that.”

Villalva had a difficult balancing act to handle—trying to maintain audience interest while also exploring the deep philosophical concepts that come with a play focused on life after death. He is able to do this through a focus on making his conversations as interesting as he can. 

“I try to picture dialogue like a choreography of words,” Villalva said. “It’s like a dance: in this conversation who is leading? Who is this for? How can all of the characters have their moment and take this script from point A to point B?” 

After a year of writing, rewriting and editing it was time for Villalva to turn the script in to be produced. He said that while this event alleviated old stress it also began generating new anxieties.  

“By the time I was done all I could think was ‘get this thing away from me before I learn to hate it,’” Villalva said. “ Spending a year with your script is exhausting and that’s what makes turning it relieving while also a little stressful. Now the world gets to see something that only belonged to me for so long.”

Shai Davis (12) was selected to be a student director for this year’s One Acts. She said that after reading Villalva’s work, she knew that this was going to be an important story and one she wanted to tell.

“I had to spend some time thinking about how I’m going to make sure that I told the story correctly,” Davis said. “It’s a very meaningful script, so I wanted to make sure that I did it right. There was a lot of taking notes, and asking [Villalva]questions to make sure that I was [interpreting] everything correctly.”

There are many approaches one can take to directing a One Act. Some directors chose to work off script alone to produce their own interpretations while others chose to work closely with the writer to make the stage the same as the page. Davis has opted to choose a healthy mix of both approaches, involving Villalva in the casting and development process while still spearheading the operation as a whole. 

“I can only do so much as the director without getting information from him about where he got his inspiration from,” Davis said.  “The process has been really great. He sat in on the first rehearsal, so I could just ask him a bunch of questions about staging ideas and stuff like that, but he’s also giving me my own freedom to take what he’s given me and run with it, which is also really good.” 

From (date) when directors are chosen to (date) when the plays are put on, the directors are on the clock. From designing the sets to coaching their actors, the directors spend hours after school perfecting their plays so that when opening night comes, they can do their scripts justice. 

“We basically have to put on a play in three weeks, which is pretty crazy,” Davis said. “But I’m very lucky in the fact that I have a smaller cast so I can work really one-on-one with each of them. The process has been going pretty quickly, which is good.” 

Villalva said that he has his full faith in Davis to execute not only a good adaptation of his script but a great play in general. 

“I love the amount of love she is putting into this, and the fact that she insists on including me shows how passionate she is about the whole thing,” Villalva said. “Sitting in with her during callbacks really showed how well she understood the characters and their interactions. It just made me feel like the script is in good hands.”