College Publisher Test Site

Issue date: 2/26/08 Section: News

Media Credit: myspace.com Jeff Wells graduated from Mesa's drama program in 2005. [Click to enlarge]

The dark room and soft lighting of Mesa's Apolliad Theater set the appropriate scene for friends and family of Jeffery Wells, an alumnus of Mesa's drama department, to memorialize their friend and loved one and to say goodbye.

The blue velvet-like stadium seats of the theater filled up with local friends of all ages, ethnicities and personalities. Many were dressed in black suits and dresses and others in jeans and hoodies. Friends embraced each other as they mourned the loss of their friend, and signed goodbyes on a white poster with a picture of Wells at the entrance of the theater.

Wells died on Feb. 2 after taking his own life in his New York apartment. He was in New York pursing his budding acting career.

"He didn't seem like the kind of person who would do this to himself," said Paul Champy, one of Wells' closest friends and fellow alumnus of Mesa's drama dept. "He was always cheerful, very active and very loving."

Wells' family held formal services for the 26-year-old in St. Louis, but the students who were in the Mesa Theatre Company with Wells and his brother Frank Wells, who attends City College, wanted to do something locally to honor him and to celebrate his life.

"Jeff had many passions in life," Cat Sharp, a former girlfriend of Jeff's, wrote in a tribute. " He had a passion for knowledge, culture and the arts, a passion for poetry, adventure and fun, a passion for travel, spirituality and laughter, a passion for friends and family."

Frank Wells arrived early to set the Apolliad Theater's stage with collages of pictures marking different events in Jeff's life. These pictures showed an energetic and adventurous Jeff doing things such as skydiving, snowboarding, performing in plays, and cliff jumping in Hawaii. It also showed an array of friends posing with Wells during after parties and events. Jeff's charismatic, bright smile, sparkling eyes, and even olive complexion were consistent throughout the collages.

As friends viewed the collages, they chuckled at the memories the pictures held, and whispered anecdotes of times they had shared with Wells, or "Wellsy" as many of them referred to him.

Continued...

Page 1 of 2 next >

Article Tools