Original Stage Play

Fall 2021

I Don’t Think I’m Ever Gonna Figure It Out

Written & Directed by Theo Billups

“Four ex-bandmates catch up a year after their band broke up. Two of them were in a long-term relationship but broke up around the time the band did. Now, at this reunion get-together, they are forced to confront the bottled-up feelings still lingering from the break-up and the reasons things ended the way they did. I Don't Think I'm Ever Gonna Figure It Out is about how we look back at relationships with hindsight and how bottled-up feelings we don’t express can take over and embitter us. It's also about how we share the music we love with each other.”

I Don't Think I'm Ever Gonna Figure It Out

Featuring: 

• Brielle Melendez

• Rutger Scott

• Julia Gazzara

• Julian Moller

Stage Manager: 

• Nick Bella

Dramaturg & Set Design: 

• Thomas Wagner

Costume Design:

• Dayna Nolan

Video Editor:

• Theo Billups

Tech Crew:

• Tomas Lignore

• Britney Quiroz

Director’s Note:

This past Spring I set out to write a play about how we look back on relationships in hindsight and memory, why we bottle up and hold onto our emotions, as well as capture the essential role music plays in our connections and interactions with our friends. It wouldn’t be until September that I realized that not only was the developing script highly personal and semi-autobiographical, but I myself was currently going through my own crisis of bottling up negative emotions and thoughts and refusing to ask for help. Upon hitting a low point and having this realization, I started to actively try to reach out to and be more honest with my trusted friends and family members, and thus began a new chapter in my mental health journey. This is all to say, I hope you see something of yourself in this play and its characters and that it might help you realize something you knew already but just needed to hear from a source outside of yourself. This play is also about joy, friendship and even has some laughs, because life is never completely sad or happy. Everyone lives with some balance of the two. Sometimes it’s hard living with both, but that’s what makes it worthwhile, right?

- Theo Billups, Nov. 2021

Check out the Spotify playlist of all the music referenced/featured here!