By Madison McCann, Editor-in-Chief
Many students are big fans of “High School Musical,” but they don’t actually see the drama behind the drama department of their own school.
Let me set the scene by going back to early September, when the theater club was thrilled to learn we would be doing “Mama Mia” for our spring musical! Then, we later found out that we were not doing “Mama Mia,” because the show is not available in this country.
Several months and musicals (eight to be exact) later, our director finally settled on “Sister Act.” That is, until we found out we might not be able to get the rights for the show because another school nearby was doing it …
Luckily, because Vashon is in the middle of the Puget Sound, isolated from other schools, we were still able to get the rights.
Then we took a closer look at our scripts and realised there were … How many group numbers?
There were six with a majority of the cast, a few solos and many smaller group numbers. However, we stuck up our chins and figured, “Hey, no big deal.”
The series of music teachers we rolled through had us reconsidering this sentiment. In past shows, we had one pianist who came in at least once a week for two months before the show, then every day the last two weeks before opening night.
However, due to a series of unfortunate events, we ended up working with five different musicians who each started teaching us the music, which was complicated to begin with.
That was all right though. Slowly but surely, we learned the music, choreographed the songs and perfected our parts. But not before heartbreak struck, and a death in the family required the week-long absence of our director, Stephen Floyd.
Then came Tech Week, the week before opening night, when the lights, sound and scene changes transform the show from a vague concept into an exact science. In the past, we depended on student Hazeline Montgomery, who acted as tech director and stage manager, and basically dedicated her life to her binders’ sound and light cues. Meanwhile, she kept everyone in line backstage.
Unfortunately, at the beginning of this year, Hazee switched schools.
With me so far?
It was at this point that I started having stress dreams about our show. I am playing Sister Mary Lazarus, the rapping choir director. In one nightmare, Floyd gave us a new script the day before the show, and we read from it in front of a live audience in a lunchroom during our dress rehearsal.
Luckily, our actual dress rehearsal turned out to be much better than my worst nightmares, and the show opened successfully on Friday, May 6. We improved every show that weekend, and now, going into our second and final weekend of the show, we have all but perfected it.
So come see “Sister Act” at 7 p.m. on Friday, May 11 or Saturday, May 12, or come out for our final performance on Sunday, May 13 at 3 p.m., and you will see that miracles can happen!