Welcome to Script Insights! Ever wonder what goes on in the mind of a playwright? In this series, you get a rare and exciting opportunity to hear directly from the authors themselves. Each article offers personal insights from the playwright, giving you a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process, character motivations, and thematic explorations that bring their scripts to life.
Below, you’ll find a downloadable blog post offering valuable insights directly from the author of The Ghost of St. Philomena's. The downloaded PDF also includes supplemental classroom activities to help you connect the play’s themes and characters with your students.
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Haunted by High School: the story behind The Ghost of St. Philomena's
Nicolette Vajtay
The Ghost of St. Philomena’s began as a horror-genre TV pilot that was scrapped after the first draft. But I had fallen in love with my leading lady, Stevie, and I wasn’t ready to let her go.
Also—I haven’t seen much horror on stage, and that excited me. Theatre is a place of magic. We don’t need elaborate sets or high-end special effects to tell a powerful story—we just need imagination, truth, and heart. So while Stevie remained, I had to build a new world for her—one shaped not by television, but by the stage… and by memories of my own high school years.
Though I’m a mature woman now, I still vividly remember the insecurities of being a teenage girl: Would I make friends? Where would I belong? Would I ever have a boyfriend? Would I make the cheerleading squad? Would I succeed—or fail miserably?
Over time, I realized I wasn’t alone. Most of us carry those same fears. And when a group of teenagers—each afraid of being different or rejected—comes together, the result can be reactive, defensive, even cruel.
The play takes place in an old 1900s brick building that once housed the mentally insane. The broken and abused souls of the former inmates still haunt the halls—a metaphoric echo of what’s happening inside the school. It’s not the ghosts who are the true monsters, but the students themselves, who persecute and abuse one another out of fear, insecurity, and the desperate need to belong.
Stevie enters this charged environment not only as the new girl, but with two secrets—either one enough to get her shunned. Stevie is psychic. (And yes—I’m a little psychic too. I believe we all have access to unseen energies, if we’re quiet enough to listen.)
While it’s the ghost of Abigail who calls Stevie to St. Philomena’s to help her transcend, I also believe Stevie was called to help a small group of students—outsiders and misfits like herself—who will, through their transformation, go on to change not only their own lives, but the lives of everyone they touch.
On page 69, Billy asks: “Do you truly believe it so simple to be kind? Why, then, does it seem that all of you harbor such hatred toward one another? I cannot fathom the cause of such animosity.”
I still can’t understand the cruelty humanity imposes on each other—through politics, religion, social norms. What will it take for us to be kind to one another? To allow people to be who they are, even if we don’t necessarily agree or approve?
In today’s world—rife with political division, social judgment, and relentless pressure to conform—this play is a reminder that we are all wounded in our own way. That’s the human experience (unfortunately). And yet, every single one of us is deserving of love and forgiveness.
That’s a choice.
I’m an “Eleanor,” through and through.
What character are you?
What are you called to do?
This play is a love letter to the girl I once was, to every teen who’s ever felt like an outsider, and to the magic—seen and unseen—that shapes us.