Sigourney Weaver, who played Ripley in Ridley Scott's space-horror Alien franchise, surprised students at an American high school on Friday as they restaged a play based on the sci-fi film.
Students at North Bergen High, in New Jersey, first put on Alien the Play last month, after which photos of their sets and costumes made from recycled materials went viral online.
Internet users were impressed with the students’ ingenuity. The show had a limited budget, so astronaut costumes were created from blankets, helmets were made by combining floor mat foam and bottle caps and one of the sets, a computer room, was even made from egg boxes.
After receiving lots of positive feedback online, Scott gave $5,000 (Dh18,365) to the school to restage the play with a bigger budget. Then, Weaver surprised the cast by stopping by for the encore performance.
In a video posted to Twitter on Friday, the 69-year-old actress is seen walking down a school hallway unannounced, before students begin to recognise her:
Sigourney Weaver visiting the NBHS cast and crew at their encore performance of Alien after national media recognition was unbelievable!! #alien #Alien40th pic.twitter.com/2UXL0v1H3X
— Nicholas J. Sacco (@NicholasJSacco) April 27, 2019
"I am representing all of the Alien fans all over the universe who think what you're doing is so cool and so important," Weaver told the students.
The show's artistic director, teacher Steven Defendini, told Buzzfeed News: "Our performance of Alien really shows you can do so much with so little. As long as there is a passion there to do these things, they are possible."
