felix1shoe — 16 years ago(June 13, 2009 02:42 PM)

Braeden received top billing in Benjamin Sprung-Keyser's play "What All School Children Learn," presented at the Blank Theatre Company's 17th Annual Young Playwright's Festival in Hollywood in the first week of June 2009.
His character, Charlie Jenkins, is bullied rather savagely by a group of larger boys led by Steven (Spencer Daniels from Star Trek). Charlie tries everything begging the older boys for mercy, feigning physical illness To avoid going to school, he creates a malady called Rabbit Fever and tries to convince his mother that he could be dying from it. I mention this because Braeden almost has never had an opportunity to be funny on his numerous TV appearances (except a little 5b4bit on Grey's Anatomy), but I got a real kick out of his delivery in this scene. Braeden's more than just a smaller version of Edward James Olmos, always deadly serious. We KNOW he can make us cry, he has done it again and again. He has a gift for making the audience/viewer feel exactly what his character is feeling. But Braeden also happens to be FUNNY. People should hire him to be funny a lot more often, because he's really good at it.
Anyhow, Charlie finally comes up with an ingenious though morally gray method to neutralize his tormentor, utilizing the bully's own severe allergy to peanuts. The play asks whether Charlie's desperate act was justified, and it does get a bit heavy-handed, though the playwright's heart is certainly in the right place. I think it is a fine effort and this is only the beginning for Mr Sprung-Keyser.
Braeden Lemasters is as good Live as he is on the record! He goes from being meek and vulnerable and worthy of pity, to being fed up, fiercely angry, wailing like a banshee with murder in his eyes. He can be a scary young man, believe me. I believe he has a long and distinguished career ahead of him and I'm very proud to call myself his fan.
He's also as nice and generous to fans as he is talented, and that is saying a lot! You're a good guy, Braeden. Thank you.