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(From left: First runner-up Ryleigh Rowcliffe, Onion Queen Jessica Pcionek, and Second runner-up Molly Geissler.)

When Jessica Pcionek was crowned Onion Queen on Saturday night, she couldn't believe it was actually happening.

"I was thinking about how I used to always go watch the Onion Queen contest when I was little, but I never really thought I would be up there doing it myself," Pcionek says. "I was shocked, but really excited at the same time because one of the dreams from my childhood came true."

Jessica is the daughter of James and Joyce Pcionek and has one sister, Jamie. She is employed at Post Farms and is a member of the Center Stage Dance Company.

She volunteers with SADD and at the Batavia Youth Bureau and is involved in many school activities including National Honor Society, Future Teachers Association, Friends of Rachel, Library Club, Drama Club, Senior High Chorus, Spirit Club, and Varsity football cheerleading. 

She plans to attend a four-year college to major in education.

The dream did not come true without hard work on Jessica's part, although she insists the whole process was "really fun."

"I had to write two essays and do four hours of community service, and then we had to go to a dinner interview and answer some questions. Then basically after that we just did the parade, rode on the float, and threw candy, which was really, really fun."

The other contestants were her classmates Ryleigh Rowcliffe, Racheal Cook, Molly Geissler and Jessica Hickey. The contest was open to incoming senior girls at Elba Central School.

"They're all my friends and I was hoping for the best for all of them," Pcionek says. "We had a lot of fun together and it's not like anyone holds a grudge or anything because we're all really good friends. I know no matter who would have won, we would have been happy for each other no matter what."

The newly crowned Queen says she loves Elba because of its size and the close-knit feeling. 

"It's a nice small community and everyone's really friendly and they're able to help you out if you get lost or something -- well, it's not like you'd really get lost in Elba in the first place. But you don't feel like you're just a number like you do in a bigger city. You get that community feel."

First runner-up Ryleigh Rowcliffe is the daughter of Garth and Mary Rowcliffe. She has two sisters, Alexandra and Meghan, and works for Oak Orchard Dairy.

She volunteers at Bezon Farms and Genesee Valley BOCES. She is involved in many activities including 4-H, FFA, and GAA. She plays varsity softball, soccer and basketball.

Ryleigh plans to attend school out of state to become a large-animal veterinarian specializing in dairy and beef cattle.

Second runner-up Molly Geissler is the daughter of David and Jane Geissler. She has one brother, Matt, and volunteers for the Elba Sports Boosters and the Oakfield Turkey Trot.

Molly is involved in many school activities including Varsity soccer, softball, and basketball. She is a member of the Future Teachers Association, National Honor Society and the Girls Athletic Association.

She will be attending the Health Careers Academy during her senior year. Molly plans to attend college to become a registered nurse.

Sorry about the darkness. 

This is the first in a series of videos we're posting to help you get to know your Batavia Muckdogs players better.

When Ella Gex entered the Army as a nurse in October of 1944, it was because, well, she never considered not joining.

"It just seemed like the right thing to do," she says. "We felt we should. They were asking for nurses, and we were all single."

The "we" she is referring to is her graduating class at nursing school. Gex, now 89 and a resident of Elba, was born and raised outside of Detroit. Upon graduating from high school in 1939, she attended the Grace Hospital School of Nursing. In 1944, she joined the Army Nurse Corps.

"When we graduated (from nursing school), over half our class went into the service," she says. "We had decided that we would all go in together. We thought we would go in as a unit, but of course we didn't."

In March 1945, Gex was stationed at Vaughn General Hospital in Chicago, and in April she was sent to Fort Riley, Kansas, where it was determined who would be stationed where. Later that month, Gex's unit sailed from San Francisco to the Philippines. They arrived in Manila on May 17, 1945.

"I remember sailing under the Golden Gate Bridge," she says. "We suddenly realized we didn't know when we were coming back."

Gex's unit was stationed at the 315th General Hospital in the Philippines. While there, she also rotated temporary duty at the 89th Field Hospital, where she cared for casualties.

"It was my first time outside of North America, but you couldn't see too much of the [Filipino] culture because it was all banged up. I don't think they had a lot of amenities like we had, no electricity. There were generators at the hospital."

Despite the distance, she managed to remain close with some of her nursing school friends who were stationed elsewhere. She laughs, recalling one particular gift sent from a friend stationed in France.

"She sent me some Chanel No. 5 and it caused quite a stir at the camp. I was down at the 8th Field Hospital at the time, and the mail would only come once a week. The perfume was cream, and it sat there in the heat for a week and stunk up the whole camp. It was solid, but it just permeated. I felt sorry for those poor guys smelling Chanel No. 5."

When Gex left the Army in December 1945, she had earned four medals: one overseas bar, a Philippines Liberation Medal, an Asia-Pacific Campaign Medal with one Bronze Service Star, and a WWII Victory Medal.

After returning from Army duty, she went back to work at Grace Hospital for four years.  In 1949 she enlisted in the Navy Nurse Corps and received a promotion to Lieutenant, J.G. She reported to Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland in October. While working there, she cared for many distinguished patients such as General Alexander Vandegrift, Fleet Admiral Earnest King, and her future husband, Navy pilot Don Gex.

"I would have liked to stay in the Navy," she reflects. "I really liked it. I loved the people that I met. Those friendships stay forever."

She shows me an old photograph of the Navy version of herself smiling next to two other nurses. "We were The Three Musketeers. Elaine was killed around 1960, but Ruthie and I still call each other two or three times a year."

Upon getting married, Gex left the Navy and moved to Greenwich, Connecticut, with Don (who was still enlisted), where they raised their children. However, after the death of her husband, she went back into nursing and spent 17 years with the American Can Company doing physical exams for coorporate officers.

She now lives in Elba, near her daughter and son-in-law, veterinarians Fran and Norm Woodworth.

When asked the differences between military nursing and regular nursing, she explains, "I think that (as a military nurse) you had more responsibility -- no, actually, I can't say that, because every life is just as important whether you're in the military or not. But the (military) nursing staff was just young kids who were given some medical training. You had more authority. But when it really comes down to it, no matter what, the care of the patient is still the primary thing."

This weekend, the Batavia Players will bring to the stage a much-loved play by one of Britain's wittiest writers: "The Importance of Being Earnest," which is among Oscar Wilde's best-known works. The satire is centered around the mistaken identities of best friends Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff after both assume the name "Ernest" for their own romantic advantages, and it backfires in a surprising plot twist.

"I like his literature," says director Justin Soble of Wilde. "He's famous for comedies in which he satirizes society. And I like British comedy. It's kind of my acting niche. So when the chance came up to direct it, I jumped." 

This is Soble's first time directing, although he is no stranger to the stage. This will mark his 20th theater production, many of which have been with the Batavia Players.

His first directing experience hasn't exactly been a perfectly smooth one, as several weeks ago the show experienced a surprising plot twist of its own: a change in venue. "Earnest" had been scheduled as the first show to be performed in the Batavia Players' new black box theater on Harvester Avenue, but the theater wasn't finished on time. The new venue is John Kennedy School.

"It's definitely different because a black box has three sides, and a proscenium setup only has one," explains Soble. "It was going to be the perfect size. But we realized two weeks ago that we weren't going to be able to do it there, and we started coming here last week. It's very different."

Charles Smith (pictured above with Katelyn Rogers), who has the role of Jack, says that although it "took a couple rehearsals to switch over," overall it is "easier to do the proscenium style because people rarely do black box."

Smith, an 18-year-old Batavia homeschooled senior, is sharing the stage with his 16-year-old brother Matthew, who is playing Algernon. The two have appeared in numerous local theater productions, most of them being with Shakespeare in Springtime and Go Art! Summer Youth Theater. Both agree that they enjoy playing opposite each other onstage.

"It makes it a whole lot easier," says Matthew. "All the stuff we do all day, every day at home, we do onstage." 

What makes it even more natural is the similarity of their characters to their real life personalities.

"My character is very serious and reserved," says Charles. "He doesn't like to have fun."

"And I'm the opposite," adds Matthew.

"That's how it is in real life, too," explains Charles.

Performances will be at 7:30 p.m., Thursday through Saturday, at John Kennedy School, 166 Vine St. in Batavia. Tickets are $10 general admission and $8 for students and seniors. Tickets are available to purchase online at www.bataviaplayers.org, at the door, or by calling 1-866-967-8167.

On Wednesday, elementary students at Elba Central School got to visit with acclaimed children's author Mary Amato. She resides in Silver Springs, Maryland, and is the award-winning author of nine books for young people, as well as numerous plays, poems and articles for publications such as Muse, Cicada, The Washington Post, Parenting, and Mothering.

Elba school librarian Christine Ferris says she likes to have a different author come speak to the students every year. 

"I got interested in [Mary Amato's] books when I read The Word Eater," says Ferris. "She writes very funny books."

The visit was arranged through the BOCES "Visiting Authors" program. The program sends suggestions to schools of various authors, and makes all of the traveling and "touring" arrangements. Amato will be visiting several other area schools as well during her visit.

During the presentation at Elba, Amato spoke to the children about her career, her life, and, foremost, her experiences with writing when she was their age.

"I tell them that I was afraid of writing," says Amato. "I thought I had no ideas, no imagination. Imagination is like a muscle. The more I wrote, the better I got. It's like sports. You wouldn't expect an olympic athlete to get a triple lutz the first time. You have to keep working on it."

She says that the turning point in her writer's block was when she was 7, when her mother gave her a journal (which she is holding in the photo above).

"My mother gave me a notebook and told me to record a trip to California. I liked the fact that I could go back and relive the moments through records of it. That's when I got hooked on writing."

She suggests that aspiring young writers do the same.

"Get a little notebook and write in it. You don't have to write in it every day, just write down some of your feelings and ideas."

More information about Mary Amato and how to contact her can be found on her website, www.maryamato.com.  The website contains information about Mary, her books and how to contact her, as well as a new video blog documenting her writing process.

Those in attendance at the Elba Music Festival Friday night certainly heard a wide variety of music. The 13 acts that performed ranged from a church choir to a punk-rock band to a barbershop quintet.

Featured performers were the Elba Concert Band, the Elba Presbyterian Church Choir, Dakota Hirsch, the Elba Saxophone Quartet, James Earl, the Genesee Chorale, the Elba Jazz Ensemble, Dixie Hirsch, Scene 7, Andrew Lacey and Michaela Stewart, M.A.C., Dillon Hirsch, and the Batavia Blue Belles. 

Here are two photos from the event: the Genesee Chorale; and the Batavia Blue Belles.

Televisions and cameras surround the action, and music thumps out of the huge speakers. People saunter by in black leather and chains, brandishing signs and video cameras. Has Judas Priest come to town? No, it's the Batavia Players' 'Shakespeare in Springtime' production of Richard III this weekend at Batavia High School. 

"It's very contemporary," says director Jane Burk. "The show goes to a very dark place, and I wanted to take advantage of that."

The show is very dark, indeed. It follows Richard, the younger brother of King Edward IV of England, and his plot to become king -- even if it means killing whoever gets in his way. 

"The play is called 'The Tragedy of Richard III' but it is not actually a true Shakespeare tragedy," Burk explains. "It was part of a series he wrote about that specific time period in English history. It's a historical play."

"[Richard III is] pretty much a guy who's really upset because he's deformed physically, and his family has rejected him," says Anthony Giambrone of his title role, which has the second-largest number of lines of any Shakespearean character. "He basically wants to become king to make people love him."

Aside from the setting and costumes, there is another unexpected twist to the show: the performance takes place behind the curtains, in the center of a ring of chairs on stage. The audience members will be sitting in these chairs, only feet away from the action, mimicking the feel of a black-box theater.

"The Batavia Players are in the process of building a black-box theater, and we had originally hoped that this would be the first show performed there," says Burk. "So when we began rehearsals, we blocked everything in this style. Once we found out that we were going to be performing here at Batavia High instead, we decided we still wanted to keep the intimacy of a black box and not just do it straight out to the audience."

"I think it's really, really cool," says Giambrone, who has previously performed in a black-box setup. "But it's a lot harder because you have the people right there in front of you, watching you really closely." 

"It's the first show I've done like this, so it's been a challenge," says Rachel Oshlag, who has the role of Queen Elizabeth. 

Although Oshlag may be inexperienced when it comes to the setup of the stage, she is no stranger to the stage itself. This is her seventh Shakespeare show, and her twenty-first year of doing theater. 

"It becomes easier each year," she says of performing Shakespeare, "but each show is its own challenge. You have to be careful how you say the lines and make it sound as close to (real) people speaking as possible." 

"Shakespeare is poetry. There's a rhythm to it that helps a lot," says Jesse Conklin, who plays Buckingham, one of Richard's right-hand men. This is Conklin's fifth 'Shakespeare in Springtime' production.

James Earl, an Elba High School senior portraying Lord William Hastings, says that for him, the highlight of the show hasn't been the costumes or the dialogue. 

"The best part about it is that I get beheaded, and then I come on carrying my head later.  The head is a cabbage in a bag," laughs Earl. "It's a lot of fun."

Performances of Richard III are Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at BHS.  Tickets can be purchased online at www.bataviaplayers.org or at the door, and are $10 general admission and $8 for students and seniors.

Jocks. Brainiacs. Skaters. Cheerleaders. It may sound like a typical high school experience, but this weekend the spectacle won't be in the Batavia High cafeteria, it'll be on the stage. 

Starting Thursday night, Encore Theatre Arts will be performing "Disney's High School Musical." The play, which is based on the smash-hit movie, follows nerdy Gabriella and jock Troy as they sing and dance their way through falling in love and discovering their place in high school.

Director Lynda Hodgins says that the play is very similar to the movie, with only a few changes, such as a new character and a slightly different setting. Some of the original characters were cut out completely, and others' parts were slightly adjusted.

"The Taylor in the musical has a bigger part than in the movie," says Maureen Edwards, 12, of her role as Gabriella's best friend. "You see her friendship with Gabriella more."

The show will also differ from the movie when it comes to dancing, says choreographer Tara Kaczorowski, who also has the part of mean-girl diva Sharpay Evans. 

"The only dance that's the same as in the movie is for 'We're All in This Together,' because we thought kids would be expecting that. Surprisingly, this has been one of the easiest shows I've choreographed so far, because the music has a good beat and it's fun to dance to," says Kaczorowski.

So is it difficult taking on the roles of some of the most beloved actors in recent 'tween media? 

"Well, I based some of my character off of Zac Efron's," says Brian Bodgan, who plays jock-turned-actor Troy Bolton. "I try to give him the same passion and pizzazz that Zac did, but I'm definitely a different Troy."

Bogdan, 24, says he was attracted to the role right away because of similarities between him and his character. 

"I was a lot like Troy in high school. I grew up playing sports year-round, and also doing theater. They always went hand-in-hand for me, and Troy is trying to find the balance between them. So I see a lot of myself in the character."

Justin Ryan, 22, who plays Sharpay's equally attention-loving sidekick, brother Ryan Evans, also has no trouble getting into his role.

"I basically am Ryan in real life," he laughs. "You know, theater geek, classy dresser. I actually used a lot of stuff from my own closet for my costumes." 

The cast, which is mostly composed of high school and college students as well as twenty-somethings, is proof that the story is popular among all ages, not just children.

"I love the movie," Edwards confesses. "I used to listen to the soundtrack every day."

"When it first came out, I thought it was fantastic, and I was in college!" says Ryan.  "There was so much hype for it, and I thought it was really great."

When asked if it was his favorite movie, Paul Teresi, 16, replies, "Duh!"

And Bogdan said "It's a story I think everyone can relate to. The characters are going through this journey of discovering themselves, and everyone goes through that in high school. It's a time for finding who you are. I think that's what makes the show so successful and recognizable."

"Encore is a new company," says Hodgins, "and they wanted to do something with a wide appeal that's a big ticket seller."

Sell tickets it surely will. After all, everybody loves a high school musical.

Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 7-9 and 2 p.m. Jan. 10 at Batavia High School. Tickets are $10 when purchased at Adam Miller Toy & Bicycles and $12 at the door.