{"id":52998,"date":"2025-04-01T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/?p=52998"},"modified":"2025-04-14T08:27:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T13:27:26","slug":"texan-theatre-debuts-original-play-based-on-2008-local-ufo-sightings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/texan-theatre-debuts-original-play-based-on-2008-local-ufo-sightings\/","title":{"rendered":"Texan Theatre Debuts Original Play Based on 2008 Local UFO Sightings"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

STEPHENVILLE, Texas \u2014 A 2008 UFO sighting in Stephenville is the subject of an original play to be presented by Tarleton State University\u2019s Texan Theatre starting April 10 in the Clyde H. Wells Fine Arts Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Poster<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The five-performance run of \u201cLights Over Stephenville\u201d will feature a community engaged play written by Tarleton State students that recounts the 2008 incident in which hundreds of area residents reported extraterrestrial activities in the sky over Stephenville.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

News agencies from across the globe converged on the town to cover the UFO sighting and interview locals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I first moved to Stephenville, I was tooling around on YouTube and I saw a National Geographic documentary about these UFO sightings in Stephenville,\u201d said Tarleton State Theater Professor Dan Stone. \u201cI thought it would make an awesome play.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stone, the director of the project, formulated a class to take the idea of a play from inception to performance. Emily Fox, James Stack, Kay Grimstad, Gabe Ramos, Elm Carter, Abigail Wilson, Lily Peltz, Bee Harris, Matthew Carlton, Jake Anderson and Caroline Bachhofer all signed up for the class which created \u201cLights Over Stephenville.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all their work,\u201d said Stone. \u201cI showed them how to do it and they took all the interviews and researched material, watched all the documentaries then synergized the stories. They did a great job. They had a blast and they learned how to create their own work. They\u2019re already talking about other projects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Research for the project included interviews with residents who witnessed the occurrence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe interviewed at Fuzzy\u2019s Tacos and people came and shared their stories,\u201d said Stone. \u201cI hung out at Jake and Dorothy\u2019s, which seemed to be the center of all this. It was a big undertaking because people had a lot of differing experiences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A throughline in the plot of the play is a reporter at the Stephenville Empire-Tribune who was the first to report on the story, which immediately garnered worldwide attention. Her refusal to back away from the story reportedly led to her dismissal, after which she claimed her work files and computer were confiscated, adding to the intrigue of the story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stone is quick to point out that the play, through based on actual events, is not a documentary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is inspired by the stories people told us,\u201d he said. \u201cThere are characters in the play that are a combination of several different people, but they\u2019re not actually people we interviewed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Evening performances are scheduled for 7:30 p.m. April 10-12. There are also 2 p.m. matinee shows set for April 12-13.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Admission is $5 for students, $8 for children and $10 for adults. Click here<\/a> or call 968-254-9634 for tickets or more information.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

STEPHENVILLE, Texas \u2014 A 2008 UFO sighting in Stephenville is the subject of an original play to be presented by Tarleton State University\u2019s Texan Theatre starting April 10 in the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":52988,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","wds_primary_category":424,"footnotes":""},"categories":[424,425],"tags":[442,453,456],"class_list":["post-52998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-events","category-campus-community","tag-community-events","tag-performing-fine-arts","tag-stephenville"],"acf":{"image":false},"author_meta":{"display_name":"priddle","author_link":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/author\/priddle-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2025\/03\/ULTRA_2024-300x200.jpg","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["Arts & Events<\/a>","Campus & Community<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Arts & Events<\/span>","Campus & Community<\/span>"]},"tags":{"linked":["Community Events<\/a>","Performing & Fine Arts<\/a>","Stephenville<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Community Events<\/span>","Performing & Fine Arts<\/span>","Stephenville<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":0,"relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 1 year ago","modified":"Updated 12 months ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on April 1, 2025","modified":"Updated on April 14, 2025"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on April 1, 2025 8:00 am","modified":"Updated on April 14, 2025 8:27 am"},"featured_img_caption":"","series_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52998"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53094,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52998\/revisions\/53094"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}