After years of serving as cogs in other inventors’ machines, they decided to invent machines of their own.

Student directors have brought their visions to life in four shows this year, the highest number in PHS history, acting teacher Kim Taylor said.

“A director is responsible first and foremost for creating the visuals of what you see on the stage,” said senior Grace Sanford, who co-directed “Doubt,” assistant directed “[title of show]” and directed “Girls Like That.” “Another thing is getting actors to understand character, understand relationships and really build chemistry between characters.”

Senior Landon Campbell became interested in directing through his experiences as an actor. He directed “Tigers Be Still.”

“In the midst of all of the performances I was in, I was always so intrigued by the backstage crew and the power that they had to be able to control and put out their message via performers,” Campbell said.

Likewise, senior Tyler Ellis developed an interest in directing when he played Snoopy in PHS’s first ever student-directed musical, “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” as a freshman. This year, he came full-circle by directing the school’s second student-directed musical, “[title of show].” He also assistant directed two shows last year and one-and-a-half this year.

“If Elizabeth Fetterolf hadn’t directed [a musical] and I wasn’t in it, I probably wouldn’t have had the guts to direct one myself,” Ellis said. “Seeing that it was possible totally helped me. I’d been wanting to direct something — a musical in particular — since then.”

Senior Saam Niami Jalinous knew from the time he was accepted into Advanced Acting that he wanted to direct a show senior year. His experience in the Alan Harvey Theater ranges from acting to doing lights to helping Acting 1 and 2 students with their scenes. In addition to directing “Doubt” last October, Niami Jalinous wrote and helped direct some of this year’s Advanced Acting May plays.

“I actually think, and Kim Taylor agrees with me, that I have more of a director’s eye than an actor’s eye,” Niami Jalinous said.

For student directors, the first step is choosing the piece. When Campbell decided to direct a play, he ordered a variety of scripts. While he thought they were entertaining, he didn’t feel emotionally moved by any of them, so he kept searching until he found “Tigers Be Still,” a nuanced comedy that follows several characters’ struggles with depression.

“With ‘Tigers,’ it gave me everything I wanted and more,” Campbell said. “It entertained me and it connected to me on an emotional level. Those were the two things originally I was looking for. But also the third thing I [had] never paid attention to is the ability to not only make me feel a certain way emotionally but deliver a strong message to the audience.”

After choosing a show, the director must get the rights from the licensing company and approval from the PHS administration. Then, they hold auditions and select a cast. Student-directed shows are self-funded, and proceeds from ticket sales go to the acting department, Campbell said.

Before starting rehearsals, Campbell read through the entire script four times, once from the perspective of each of the four characters.

“It was easy for me to have goals and a stronger vision for my actors,” Campbell said.

When directing a scene, Niami Jalinous asks the actors to find one verb to describe their characters’ actions and goals in the scene. Although Niami Jalinous tries to leave it up to the actors’ interpretation, he will steer them toward what he thinks is the emotional core of the scene.

“I also write a lot, so the words really mean a lot to me and I really believe in strict interpretation of what’s being given and at the same time allowing self-emotion to spin it a certain way,” Niami Jalinous said.

One surprise for Ellis was that, in addition to directing and producing “[title of show],” he performed in it. Being an actor made the process more collaborative, he said.

“It [was] more friendly and inclusive in regards to directing because I [was] in it,” Ellis said.

Campbell considers the idea-sharing and relaxed atmosphere characteristics of the West Coast style of directing. Campbell spent the past two summers doing theater in New York, an environment he considers more cutthroat and hierarchical.

“Finding an in-between to [the East Coast and West Coast styles] developed my voice as a director,” Campbell said.

Campbell calls his technique “directing without directing”: he sets the actors in the right direction without telling them what to do. This prevents the emotions from becoming dull or fake, he said.

“I wanted them to play my vision but also their vision. And that’s what the audience saw,” Campbell said. “Emotion is playing it how [the actor] feel[s], not how Landon feels, not how the director feels.”

Similarly, Sanford balances letting the actors follow their instincts with telling them how she wants a scene to look.

“Sometimes I kind of sit back and let them do something and sometimes I feel really involved,” Sanford said.

One dynamic that is unique to student-directed shows is that directors and cast members are often the same age.

Ellis said that he had envisioned directing younger students in “[title of show].” Instead, the four-member cast included three seniors.

“I thought would be a really big issue but surprisingly enough, it hasn’t been an issue at all,” Ellis said. “There’s so much respect in the room.”

Sanford said that it’s a unique relationship to be directing classmates, many of whom she considers friends.

“It’s walking the boundary between not acting like too much of an authority figure but also just knowing that when you’re in rehearsal, the relationship changes,” Sanford said.

Freshman Chelsea Fox, who assistant directed “Tigers Be Still,” said that one challenge of directing is thinking critically about your show.

“Being a director, the play becomes your baby,” Fox said. “You need to be able to take initiative and you need to allow other people to help you and bring in their opinions.”

Niami Jalinous said that with “Doubt,” Taylor’s role was only to give suggestions until tech week, when she became more like an assistant director.

For Sanford, the best part of directing is seeing how her ideas connect to people in the audience.

“One of the greatest feelings is when you show [a play] to an audience and the audience reacts to something that you’ve created,” Sanford said. “They’ll laugh at something and you’re like, ‘That was my idea.’ It’s just a validating feeling.”