{"id":8712,"date":"2016-09-09T16:35:37","date_gmt":"2016-09-09T16:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/idsunmedia.com\/?p=8712"},"modified":"2016-09-09T16:35:37","modified_gmt":"2016-09-09T16:35:37","slug":"alma-ceja","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2016\/09\/09\/alma-ceja\/","title":{"rendered":"Alma Ceja"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lighting Up the Stage<\/i><\/span><\/h2>\n

BY JONATHAN KANE<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Wood
Wood River High School senior Alma Ceja. Photo courtesy of Alma Ceja<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Alma Ceja, a senior at Wood River High School carrying a 3.5 grade point average and a member of National Honor Society, knows how to light up a stage. She also has a great singing voice that she shows off in the school\u2019s singing group, Enchante.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just love to be on stage,\u201d Ceja said. \u201cI love being able to put smiles on people\u2019s faces and make them laugh, make them cry, and to tell all these stories through theater.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Ceja puts it, there is nothing more rewarding than seeing an audience enjoy a show. And she has been a theater person since she was little.<\/p>\n

\u201cI loved playing pretend games with my mom and at school. I would basically create a character and be a hundred percent committed to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

In that way Ceja would be someone completely different from herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would think and speak like the character and I would love it,\u201d she said. \u201cMy favorite part was seeing all these different points of view and perspectives as though I was living a whole different life.\u201d She would base these characters on people that she had seen before.<\/p>\n

\u201cBasically, they were all comedic characters. I enjoy making people laugh and it\u2019s the best feeling in life when you can make someone happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ceja\u2019s favorite character was Sandy from \u201cSpongeBob SquarePants.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI would make her human. She was always really funny to watch and I loved the way that she treated boys.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ceja\u2019s earliest memory of performing was in first grade.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was at Bellevue Elementary School and I was a cat,\u201d she said. \u201cI remember being scared and nervous to have people watch me even though I didn\u2019t have any lines. It ended up going very well, and when it was done, I felt awesome. Amazingly, my nerves were completely gone.\u201d<\/p>\n

In high school, Ceja started with small roles with no lines, though she worked \u201creally hard in class and on stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the spring of her sophomore year, she got the lead in a one-act.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt went really well and I received the award for best actress [award] that year for my performance. It was my first role and I worked really hard and it went really well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ceja did a lot of character work for the part. \u201cI would think about my character \u2013 what she had done before \u2013 and I would invent what her life was like. I really liked her and the audience could see that it was something different.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her junior year Ceja was the lead in both school plays, \u201cTaming Romeo\u201d and \u201cNoises Off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat play was so hilarious that it was hard not to laugh on stage. Afterwards, I felt famous because everyone in school recognized me. It was the best feeling ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a feeling that Ceja is sure to experience many times again in the future.<\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s Note:<\/i><\/b> Anyone who would like to recommend a Blaine County School District student for The Weekly Sun\u2019s \u201cStudent Spotlight\u201d feature should contact Jonathan Kane at jkjonkane@gmail.com.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lighting Up the Stage BY JONATHAN KANE Alma Ceja, a senior at Wood River High School carrying a 3.5 grade point average and a member of National Honor Society, knows how to light up a stage. She also has a great singing voice that she shows off in the school\u2019s singing group, Enchante. \u201cI just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8713,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,38,41],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-8712","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-schools","8":"category-sponsored","9":"category-student-spotlight"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}