Anytown sends opioid abuse message

The George Street Playhouse Educational Touring Theatre from New Brunswick debuted their new musical about opioid abuse at Vernon Township High School, generating a day of conversations at the surprisingly refreshing tale about how easy it is to slip into abuse from prescribed painkillers.

The play, roughly an hour long, follows a top student and star athlete who is injured in a soccer game, and goes from a legitimate prescription for pain to stealing pain pills from a friend’s medicine cabinet to buying heroine or “hero” from a dealer at school. The writer, Jim Jack, and small cast handled a tough topic with honesty, humor and compassion. Many of the students appreciated the original approach to the serious subject even while others did not like the ending because there was no resolution about whether the student kicked the opioid habit or not.

As one student wisely countered, “Well, there are only two ways heroine addiction can end...”

Based on interviews with families struggling with the disease of addiction, opioid prevention experts, law enforcement officials, and educators, this original musical was developed in response to the devastating impact prescription opioid misuse, heroin, and fentanyl have had on communities throughout New Jersey.