In the play “The Laramie Project,” Will Rundle, senior in performing arts, gets to transform into characters he admires and loathes.

The play is about the effects of the murder of Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyo. Shepard was a student at the University of Wyoming who was tortured and murdered for being gay.

Rundle, a bisexual, said he relates to narrator Jedadiah Schultz, a performing arts student who is studying theater and reverses his views of homosexuality in the media in the aftermath of Shepard’s murder.

However, Rundle also portrays the two men who tortured Shepard: Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson.

He is determined to portray both of them as though they could be anybody, because, according to the play, they were.

“The descriptions of him by other characters in the play — not so much in terms of values and things like that, but in terms of personality — I am a lot like him,” Rundle said. “That’s a really scary thing to think about.”

The eight actors in “The Laramie Project” will portray nearly 40 characters. This is not your typical play.

Lisa Nelson, sophomore in chemical engineering and in her first ACTORS role, said the character of Romaine Patterson, a close fiend of Shepard, was the character she admired most and her favorite to perform.

“When Fred Phelps was at Matthews’ funeral, she got ignited about it,” she said. “She turned her sadness and grief into something good for the world … It’s one of the most moving scenes in the play for me.”

Geri Derner, co-producer of the play, said the audience should not expect a traditional play. The actors are running around everywhere and no one person stays in one character for long; they sometimes portray two people in the same scene.

Rundle said the play is about examining where society stands on issues such as social justice.

“To me, ultimately it’s a reflection. It’s trying to hold a mirror up and show both the people of Laramie and Americans in general and make them really look at what’s going on. As one character in the play says, ‘People need to talk about this.’”

Nelson said the issue is that Laramie was like any other community. The incident there could have happened anywhere; no place is immune.

As McKinney, Rundle must talk about the murder in a style that is almost bragging about what he did.

“It’s a rather horrifying scene,” he said. “And that he’s just another kid around town.”

After the two performances Friday and Saturday, there will be an open discussion about the play’s  themes.