SUNDAY, AUGUST 05, 2007
Senioritis, from Cappies
Senioritis, as a colloquial term, refers to the
tendency of some high school seniors to slack off after getting college
acceptance during their senior years at high school. This has become a big
problem at some universities, who have sometimes withdrawn acceptances, or
placed students on probation at admission.
The musical Senioritis(135
min) is produced by Cappies, and written by nine students in Virginia and
Maryland. The book writers are Miriam Engle and Maggie Shaw; the music
composers are Riley Keenan, Dustin Merrell, A. J. Pendola,
Abi York; the lyrics are by Erick Pope and Maddie Underwood. The play is
directed by Glen Hochkeppel. I attended a performance
Aug. 5, 2007 at McLean High School in northern Va. The
show started about twenty minutes late, as the production team set up digital
recording and rehearsed the audience in applause, talking, and laughing, to add
to the DVD, which will eventually be sold.
The musical is in two Acts, and seventeen scenes, with
an intermission after Scene ten. Some scenes have more than one song, and
others are all spoken. The stage props are rather simple but fill the wide
stage with color, giving the effect of a 3-D movie of a musical of the
'Hairspray' genre. It reminded me more of that than of the obvious 'High School
Musical.'
Nevertheless, the story concerns a number of students
slacking off while producing their own musical, a 'High School Mystical.' Some
of the songs have surprising and amusing names, such as 'C's and D's Are Very'
Good for You' (the teachers); Senioropolis (where
the kids stage the musical in mock Greek times with togas and just a hint of
dirty dancing), 'Crackdown.' 'Older Woman and a Younger Man', 'You're Fired'
and 'Admission to Life' which is what college is for.
In fact, there are some clever lines about other
social issues, like a 'global warming drill' or a line where one student fills
out his college admission essay and wants to say, 'If I don't go to college,
I'll have a miserable life.' Later, the student contests what his father wants
him to do with his life. There are little shreds of issues of great moral
importance. The conspicuous regal character in "Mystical" seems to be
called "Babushka" -- I'm not sure of the significance of using a
Russian doll (there is actually a toy retail chain by that name, as in the Mall
of America near Minneapolis) as character nickname.
Apparently
this musical will be performed in the Kennedy Center lab, Aug 6-7.
Andrew Karlsruher has
directed a short subject on this theme that Fox Searchlight Pictures is due to
release this year.
In 1956, in 7th grade, I acted in the comic operetta
"The Sunbonnet Girl" by Morgan and Johnson. The operetta seems to
date back to about 1930, descriptive link here.
Posted by Bill Boushka at 3:32 PM
Labels: high school productions, musical
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