BY BETTY SCHOENBAECHLER

Special To the Bulletin

ATLANTA—Bonnie E. Spark is very aptly named. For the past 18 years, she has provided the spark that has built the reputation of the St. Pius X High School Drama Department as a first-class theater group that offers very polished, professional productions, consistently, year after year.

She also has brightened the lives of the hundreds of young people who have come through her class doors to gain knowledge, confidence and a deeper sense of who they are and what they can become. While she believes each student has enriched her life, the truth is Bonnie Spark has left an indelible mark on many of theirs.

Spark teaches beginning acting, intermediate acting, speech and diction, advance scene study and improvisation, directing and the history of theater and Shakespeare. She directs the 70-member Pius Players in five productions each year, usually rehearsing three different plays at any given time.

The self-proclaimed "transplanted Yankee" said she has very high expectations of her students, and they never let her down.

"I don't treat my students as if they are merely children," she said. "My perspective is these very talented young people are performers. When I'm directing a play I know what I want and I know how to get it. When we have rehearsal sessions I explain my expectations, what the situation is and I expect them to bring to the table as much information and knowledge as they possibly can. Some of the kids have had outside training. They are very astute, very intuitive, have an abundance of imagination and they want to perform more than anything else in the world. With all those factors, you cannot help but succeed."

The Pius Players are divided into the Main Stage Group, comprised of the more experienced actors, the Junior Company and the Workshop Players.

"This year I'm hosting a ninth grade rehearsal so we may be adding a few more students."

This fall, the Players will open the Neil Simon comedy, Rumors, on Oct. 19, and at the annual Fall Arts Festival, they will perform scenes from Twelve Angry Women, based on the classic Twelve Angry Men, and Picasso at the Lapinagile, a new Steve Martin play. In November, the students will perform Babes in Toyland as an Advent program for young children. The spring musical has yet to be announced.

"I choose the plays we perform based mainly on the talent and personalities that I have at the present time," Spark said. "I want to showcase my actors at their best potential. This year I don't have a lot of serious actors, most of them are very funny and intuitive, so they do comedy better. Coming up next year in the junior class, we have some classical actors."

Spark said that her hope for each of her students is that they have "an unforgettable experience" doing something they would never get the chance to do anywhere else. "Acting gives these students the opportunity to get in touch with their raw emotions, with their soul, as they learn to turn themselves into the character we see on stage," she said.

This process of self discovery helps the students gain the confidence and self-esteem they will need to mature into disciplined, self-motivated adults. "I tell every class I teach that I teach to succeed, not to fail. They know my expectations, both on-stage and off, and they always deliver," she said.

"I like for people to work to their potential. I tell my students, don't be afraid, just get out there and do it. Both my parents encouraged and inspired me to let nothing stand in my way or discourage me from doing what I wanted to do. That's why after college at William and Mary in Virginia, and a year of teaching, I packed my bags and moved to New York to be an actor."

Spark began her life on-stage singing at age 1½. At age 5, she was studying classical ballet from an instructor who insisted she would take no student under age 7.

"I've never been off the stage since," she said. "I do love it. My mother's entire family is extraordinarily talented. We have pianists, violinists, actors, dancers and singers. My father had none of the talent, but a great deal of appreciation. I inherited all my family's non-money making skills. I've always said, my Dad should have taught me to be a mechanic. A singing mechanic would be very popular and likely make lots of money."

In New York she appeared with Alfred Drake in Kismet, Dorothy Collins in Do I Hear a Waltz and Chita Rivera in Wonderworld. After she moved to the South, Spark had feature roles in Annie Get Your Gun, Fiddler on the Roof and Broadway Cabaret at the Harlequin Dinner Theater and the Barn Door Theater.

"People ask me all the time why I'm not performing now. My answer is, this is my job and my joy. I'm here every afternoon from August until May directing.”

Spark said that Msgr. Terry Young, former principal of St. Pius, was instrumental in getting her off the stage and into the classroom. "He asked me to develop the drama department and gave me carte blanche to create the program we have today," she said. "He had great faith in my ability and was my guardian angel, my personal saint, and with his constant support and encouragement, the program took off."

"It's taken us 18 years to become an overnight success," she laughed.

"Bonnie Spark has, through her work with students at St. Pius X over the years, unlocked the potential and talents of so many young people seeking to express themselves artistically," said Donald T. Sasso, principal. "Also, her work and the work of her students in their various productions have provided tremendous enjoyment and satisfaction for their audiences."

In every St. Pius production, each of the young actors has to do his or her share of the "grunt" work, as well as the high profile "fun" jobs. Students are responsible for everything from make-up, clean-up and costumes to serving as a production assistant or a student director. Through their work with the theater, the students learn organizational skills in addition to acting, directing and diction.

Spark tells her young actors that they should treat acting as an avocation, not as a vocation. "I tell them that acting has a 99 percent unemployment rate. Some of them have not listened and are now seeking a professional career in acting," she said.

One Pius alumnus, John McCarthy, can be seen on stage at the Alliance Theater. He will also play in Macbeth at the Georgia Shakespeare Festival beginning in October. The 1993 graduate said that Spark has come to watch everything he has done professionally.

He credits her with teaching him fundamentals like how to stand, turn and walk on a stage. "That sounds so simple, but it's not," he said. "She taught me to use my voice to fill the room so that it can reach every person in the theater. These lessons come in handy all the time," he said.

McCarthy played King Arthur in the Pius production of Camelot his senior year in high school. "I sang five songs and I'm not a singer. But by the last night I finally got the high notes."

McCarthy said that he was not a model student and that Spark made him leave the drama department in his sophomore year because he was in trouble too often. "I came back a year later and asked her if I could be a part of the program again. I started to carry myself differently and found that once I channeled the energy I used to get into trouble onto the stage, I was a different person. I released whatever needed to be released onto the stage."

McCarthy was a drama major at the University of Georgia for three years before studying at the Marymount London Drama Program for a year.

There are many other graduate success stories, and Spark can instantly recall what was unique about each of them.

She considers her students, current and former, their parents and her colleagues at St. Pius a huge extended family.

"The incredible love and encouragement and continuous friendships that have evolved out of my association with St. Pius is probably enough to fill two lifetimes. I couldn't be more grateful and blessed."