Moon Over Buffalo, the latest play staged by the Akins Journey Theatre, answers a common question seen in the media today: What are people willing to do to become famous?

The answer it turns out is almost anything.

And when fame eludes the characters in the play, the result if often hilarity. And that is one of the reasons theater teacher Maureen Siegel selected the 1995 play written by Ken Ludwig to open this year’s theater season.

“I picked Moon Over Buffalo because I was looking for a really funny show, I laughed a lot while reading it,” she said. “I fell in love with it instantly.”

The play takes place in the 1950s focusing on the sad lives of washed up actors who want to regain the spotlight in Hollywood films. Much of the play focuses on the antics of cheating spouses, secret plots and the dreams of people who want out of the lives they are currently living.

The work and effort theatre students contributed to this play are shown through their dedication. Students stayed after school regularly until 9 p.m. and attended weekend practice to get the play perfected.

There were two different casts that performed for two days each. The alternating casts made each performance distinct, said students in the play.

“Each cast had a different way that they play it, you can see the different choices they make for their characters,” senior Jose Cantu said. “All the choices they made turned out really well.”

The cast overcame some obstacles throughout the performances.

“It has gotten a lot better over time. Before we were doing the show it was really iffy, because we weren’t quite sure of how well we were going to do,” Cantu said. “During the past few shows everyone has gotten it together.”

The Akins journey theater is now working on You’re A Good Man Charlie Brown, the musical, involving mostly freshmen and sophomores.

“It’s a building year for the department,” Siegel said. “We have a really strong incoming class and I’m really excited about that.”