Production Tips for
The Super Non-Heroes
by Taryn Temple
Have you ever felt like you don’t belong? Powerless Charlie sticks out like a sore thumb in a school full of superheroes. Smellinator can’t control her powers and forgot to do her Villain 101 homework. Golden Boy won’t follow protocol. And Toxic Sludge is, well, toxic sludge.
When a supervillain attacks the school Charlie must dig deep within herself. She may not be a superhero but she discovers her unique talents to save the day.
A fabulous middle school play that looks at friendship, acceptance and discovering yourself. Who doesn’t want to be a superhero?
Average Producer Rating:
Home page for
The Super Non-Heroes
Recommended for Middle Schools
Tips from past Producers
Costumes play a large role in establishing characters, but they are fairly simple costumes to find or produce.
Get creative with the Special Effects, especially making Smellinator's superpower come to life in making things appear. We used a student in a black morph suit to "magically" get things onto the stage.
As a director, there is SO much opportunity for creative choices in deciding who these characters are and how to represent them on stage. Our production traveled for a one-act play festival, so we had to keep our set simple and transportable. We used a comic book theme to help inspire our ideas, so we had blocks that looked like comic strip blocks that we could configure into any shape or look that we wanted. We used lightweight backdrops with comic themed images in bright colors to help set the stage. In lieu of programs, we created an opening video which reflected all of the program info, similar to the opening credits/theme of a tv show. We did some green screen filming to use in the video and to create character posters to reflect each actor, their character and their powers, which we hung in the foyer.
Make sure each actor knows what their character’s super power is. Once they get that, they really dive into the role!