An emergency broadcast erupts stating there’s a quarantine in towns. Six teens, the “Knuckleheads,”  try to survive the zombie apocalypse together in a car with the goal of making it to a cabin.

The alarm blaring at the beginning of the play immediately got my attention, the man on the radio explaining everything that was going on in the world made me feel like it was something that could actually happen. While the teenagers mostly didn’t take the situation seriously, the way they responded to what was happening made the play seem real. The jokes and humor during the play stood out to me because even though an apocalypse was going on, the teens still have ways to express their emotions.

What got my attention the most was the lighting. In one scene the lights were off, the next scene all the lights were colorful but the lighting in the ending scene was the most interesting to me as they just used a phone screen. I didn’t know a screen could be that bright in the dark.

The teens start off in the middle of nowhere on a street. They drive all day and night having conversations about whether they prefer Doritos or Fritos, or whether they like Pepsi or Coke more. The mentioning of the real world snacks, even if the world is ending, makes the actors seem like they are real teenagers experiencing the zombies. 

The different personalities in the group made the people seem more interesting: a boy athlete who was religious, a sarcastic girl who made jokes and teased the whole time, and another girl who had hope that everything was going to go back to normal. While the other characters had personalities, these people were the ones that stood out to me. Dead Highway won several awards at the Thespian Festival in Missoula in January, and the cast performed the play seven times for the staff and students on Feb. 7.