March 16, 2001

At a local church two Fridays ago, an actor playing a teen-age killer mused about the students he gunned down in a rampage at his high school.

"When you have a gun, people talk nice," he said, conversing with the ghosts of his victims.

It was a play, of course -- a play intended to turn kids away from violence. But given the events in Santee, the play has taken on new relevance for the actors.

"It's been hard, realizing that what we're doing is so close to real life," said Matthew Weatherman, a 16-year-old who plays the killer in "Bang, Bang, You're Dead," written by William Mastrosimone of Seattle after the school shootings in Springfield, Ore., in May 1998.

A troupe from Coronado High School has been performing the play at local churches. The students presented it at San Diego's First Brethren Church little more than 48 hours before the shootings at Santee.

The play follows a student named Josh as he develops homicidal fantasies after being the butt of his classmates' jokes. It is staged in a jail cell, where the ghosts of five classmates visit Josh, asking why he killed them.

"Josh is not necessarily sick, but he's never listened to, never heard, until the pressures build up and he acts in a very tragic way," said drama teacher Liz O'Neal, who directs the play. After each performance, the actors talk with the audience about how to lessen the threat of violence.

The members of the troupe were at school when they heard of the shootings in Santee. Weatherman immediately called to check on his friend Josh Murray, who attends Santana High. Murray had been just 30 feet down the hall when shots began. He saw four of his friends get hit.

Weatherman said the play makes it clear that "you can't just write these kids off as mentally unstable."

The play will next be performed at All Souls Church in Point Loma on Sunday.