Local actor Kelli Chaves has been preparing her current project for almost seventh months.

She said she's needed every single day of it.

Chaves, a University of Nebraska-Lincoln theater student, is presenting the Murmur Theater Company production of Pamela Gien's "The Syringa Tree."

The one-woman show, which opened last night at Lincoln Southwest High School, tells the story of a family living in apartheid South Africa.

Chaves is performing all 24 characters in the script.

"Although it's really been hard, everything is starting to come into place," the 19-year-old sophomore said.

"When I got done performing the first half all the way through the first time, I was not with the real world," she added. "I couldn't believe I had done an hour and half of just me. It's weird."

"The Syringa Tree" is Murmur Theater Company's second (and possibly final) production. It produced David Mamet's "Oleanna," featuring Chaves and Brad Boesen,  in August 2003 at the Haymarket Theatre.

Murmur founder Jeffrey Little,  former Lincoln Southwest assistant theater director, is leaving for China in January to study and teach.

But before leaving, he wanted to direct Gien's drama, which he discovered while working for an off-Broadway theater promotions company in New York City.

Originally produced in 2001 in the Big Apple, "The Syringa Tree" springs from Gien's imagination and is based loosely on her own experiences as a child growing up in apartheid South Africa.

The play follows the lives of two children, one white and one black, born into a shared household near Johannesburg, South Africa, in the early 1960s.

Six-year-old Elizabeth Grace serves as the audience's guide as she struggles to make sense of the chaos, magic and darkness surrounding her.

Chaves, through the 24 very different characters (black, white, old, young, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Zulu, English, Jewish, etc.), tries to convey not only the story of love between two families, but also the history of a magical, but troubled nation.

The New York Times called the off-Broadway production "instantly engaging … a thoroughly persuasive transport to an exotic place and time."

Little said it blew him away the first time he saw it.

"It's an amazing story," he said. "It's narrated by this 6-year-old. She doesn't understand what's going. She only knows what's happening to mom and what's happening to dad."

To prepare, Chaves revisited her youth by spending time with elementary-aged children. It was her homework assignment.

"Things are very simple to them," she said. "It kind of made me wish I was 6 again."

Chaves, who gave a stirring turn as an abused teen in the UNL production of "How I Learned to Drive" last February, also worked hard perfecting dialects, hand gestures and head movements. The goal, she said, is to have the audience distinguish between multiple characters.

"This person is 82 and this person is 26, and I want you to be able to tell them apart," she said.

Little said audiences will be wowed by Chaves' performance. Her budding talent is the reason he chose her for the project.

"From a teaching aspect, she was ready for it," he said. "This is her next challenge … to carry a performance on her own."

Reach Jeff Korbelik at 473-7213 or jkorbelik@journalstar.com.

If you go

What: "The Syringa Tree," Murmur Theater Company

When/where: 7:30 tonight, Lincoln Southwest High School, 7001 S. 14th St.; 3 p.m. Sunday and 7:30 p.m. Monday, Studio Theatre, third floor, Temple Building, 12th and R streets

Tickets: $10 adults, $6 students; available at the door