Iola High sophomore Max Andersen etched his name in school history over the weekend, winning a state title for his prose.
Andersen’s win for his oral interpretation of the children’s book “Ace Lacewing: Bug Detective” highlighted a dazzling day on the stage for IHS, which corralled a trio of top-three finishes at the Class 4A State Speech and Drama Championships, hosted by Washburn Rural High School.
He was joined on the medal stand by fellow forensics stalwarts Kendall and Everett Glaze, who teamed up to take third in duet acting for their piece, “How To Survive A Horror Movie,” and Demarco Ross, who took third for oral interpretation of poetry with “Who Gives A Black Man Permission to Feel?”
Tack on Andersen’s improvised duet acting performance with Cole Moyer, which took eighth, Macie Hoag’s ninth-place finish in impromptu speaking, Everett Glaze placing 10th in humorous solo acting and Moyer taking 11th in prose, and you have a seventh-place team finish.
But the day belonged to Andersen, who captured Iola’s first individual forensics title since 2015, when Garrett Prall and Emma Piazza won in duet acting and Trilby Bannister won gold in humorous solo acting.
“Of course, I thought about it, but I didn’t dare bring it up,” he chuckled. “I don’t want to seem like I’m bragging, but I’m proud. I worked my tail off.”
WITH “Ace Lacewing,” Andersen tells the story of a bug detective tasked with figuring out the mystery of royalty gone missing.
Seems somebody has kidnapped Queenie Bee.
Enter Ace, a cross between Jiminy Cricket and Sam Spade, in a “dark, gritty noir-type thing,” as described by Andersen.
The story, pulled from a children’s book penned and illustrated by David Biedrzycki, was discovered by Anderson’s forensics teacher Regina Chriestensen.
“Mrs. C has what’s almost like a vault with all of these different pieces,” Andersen said. “She brought this to me and I liked it from the very beginning.”
In fact the toughest part about preparing the piece was trimming it down.
Prose entries must be completed within seven minutes. Andersen’s first read-through clocked in at over 10.
“We had to do a lot of cutting and splicing,” Andersen said. “It wasn’t too bad, but we had to cut a lot.”
Still, it took a remarkably short amount of time for Andersen to find his groove. Out of the numerous events in which he competed, Andersen took first in all but one.
“I was confident,” he said, “but not overconfident.
“One of the fun things about forensics is that it’s kind of unpredictable,” he continued “especially with how you’re gonna be scored. At a certain level, each of the judges has likes and dislikes, and that definitely reflects in their notes.”
