In my senior year I took speech class with Mr. William Jennings. I took the class because I knew I was not good at getting up in front of people and giving speeches and I needed to improve my skills in that area.
Mr. Jennings was a very good teacher, but more than that, you felt like he was a friend as much as a teacher. He made class fun. Mr. Jennings was also the sponsor for the Thespians, the drama group at MH, and was the director for the Junior Class Play, the Senior Class Play and the Thespians Play.
Mr. Jennings had chosen the play “My Sister Eileen” for the Senior Class Play and preparations began early in the fall. He asked me to try out for the play and so I did. My part was to be one of 6 Brazilian sailors (future admirals in the cast) who followed Eileen home to the girl’s apartment. MH had bought new scenery that year and it all needed to be put together, primed and painted. I spent many more hours working on that scenery that I spent learning my part which consisted of only three lines in Portuguese. It probably didn’t matter too much how well I said my lines since I doubt that anyone in the audience knew Portuguese.
My other fellow Brazilian sailors were Bob Morris, Larry Smith, Roger Fuller, Gary Pence and Jim Rebhorn. I always knew him as Jim Rebhorn and don’t ever remember calling him James but I guess it sounds better for a professional name.
I do remember one incident during rehearsal that the 6 of us were supposed to learning our lines and learning how to do a Congo line which we do during the play. We were goofing off as a lot of high students do and not making much progress. Mr. Jennings blew his top and yelled at us and told us to get out in the hallway and get to work on our part which we promptly did. You couldn’t stay mad at Mr. Jennings for long and we were all guilty as charged.
We gave two performances of the play on a Friday and Saturday night on the big stage at the end of the gym. As I remember they went off well and it was well received by the audience. The other thing I remember was that my costume was Mr. Redding’s old Navy uniform from World War II. I was not overweight but I was a lot bigger than Mr. Redding and the uniform was very very tight and I knew it afterwards.
In the spring the Thespians presented the murder mystery “A Murder Has Been Arranged” and I was the Student Director. Jim Rebhorn had a more major part in the play so I can claim that I had some part in his training. (Not really, Mr. Jennings did all the directing and I built the set.)
I remember Jim Rebhorn just as one of the guys and I don’t remember any comments about him wanting to make acting his career. I see in our senior yearbook that I was standing besides Jim in the Thespians and Debate Club photos.
In the 1980s when I first became aware that Jim had made acting a career, I recognized his face but did not recognize his voice. Now I have become so familiar with his voice that I have forgotten what he sounded like in high school. Of course the big difference is that in high school he had a full head of hair.
James Rebhorn has become the most famous and recognizable of our classmates from the Class of 1966. Go to www.imdb.com to see a listing of his performances. We wish him the best and look forward to his next performance. We look forward to seeing James at one of our future reunions. Recently there has been some debate about who taught James his acting skills and launched his career. A fellow Brazilian sailor (Bob Morris) has made that claim but that is something to talk about at our next reunion.
Even though I only had Mr. Jennings as a teacher for that one year in high school, I have such fond memories of learning from and working with him. I was very sad at hearing of his passing. He will not be forgotten.
David Vern Addington, Class of 1966
