An Immersive Play That Transports You to a Chicago Public High School

In ninth grade, I transferred to a new school and spent the first few months eating lunch alone in a bathroom stall. Things got better, I made friends, and I now look back on high school fondly. But I was reminded of that painful ritual recently when I found myself alone in a high-school bathroom with seventeen-year-old Cheyenne Murphy, in a scene from “Learning Curve,” an immersive theatre production that lets participants experience life in the Chicago public schools. As I stood in a corner, Murphy faced the mirror and wrote on it the features and qualities that she disliked about herself. Then she invited me to do the same. “Big ears,” I wrote. “Plays it safe.” High school is a scar that we all share.