Boommate and I were driving past the high school yesterday on our way back home from exercise class when we noticed an ad for the upcoming high school fall play 12 Incompetent Jurors.
We both thought it would be a fun play to see. I looked it up when we got home. It is a parody of 12 Angry Men and is about the jury deliberations in a case in which a man has confessed to stealing a number of cats. One of the Jurors doubts the facts in the case and holds out on a guilty verdict. Chaos apparently ensues.
I never was in plays in musicals in high school, although I was on the speech team and gave dramatic interpretations of Anna Christie and Long Days Journey Into Night. As a musician I was in the pit orchestra for Li’l Abner, The Music Man, and Bye Bye Birdie. I was too introverted to try out for a role in the non-musical productions. Looking back, I regret that. Our children were braver. Our son was a dancing/ singing cowboy in Oklahoma and our daughter was one of the wives in The King and I in high school.
Were you in plays or musicals in high school or college? Do you attend productions at your local high school? If you could go back in time, what role would you want in a play or musical?
I was a theater geek in high school and also did dramatic interp. I had the role of the stage manager in Our Town and Miss Madrigal in Chalk Garden. My friend who played Laurel also did interp so we did a scene from Chalk Garden and actually made it to state with it. We knew the parts so well for that scene that we could switch the roles. But I really enjoyed backstage better. I worked on sets and props and staging and cue-ing. A lot more diversity and a lot less stress. In college I played a couple of very small bit parts but mostly did assistant directing.
I attend school plays if one of the kids I know are in them. In fact, one of my little friends (who used to live next-door) is appearing at the Chanhassen Dinner Theater this fall and winter. It’ll be the first time I’ve been to the Chanhassen Dinner Theater!
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I wasn’t involved in theater or in any other extracurricular activities in high school. I would say that, other than academics, my connection with high school was tenuous. My focus on academics was not all that strong either. From age 16 I had an after-school job.
In another life, I would have enjoyed working behind the scenes on crew. I would have been a terrible, self-conscious actor, never able to step out of myself.
When my younger daughter was in high school she was part of the theater set, working as stage manager and behind the scenes. When the wife of the director put out a call for parents to help with the costuming, Robin and I volunteered. As it turned out we were the only parents that did so. Over the course of my daughter’s high school years we costumed Oklahoma, Fiddler on the Roof, Pirates of Penzance, Guys and Dolls, Damn Yankees and Joseph and His Many-Colored Dreamcoat. That entailed many late nights since we both had day jobs but it was fun. We consequently attended all those productions, often more than once. Later we both volunteered in the costume shop of the (old) Guthrie for a season or two.
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Bill – Which high school did she attend? We might have seen the Guys and Dolls performance…
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Hopkins. This was in the late ‘90s.
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Oh, then I guess not… do remember Robin working on costumes still, in the early 2000s?
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That would probably have been at the Guthrie.
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I did not get drawn into theater in high school, but as a 10-year-old in Storm Lake, IA, my sis and I got to be in a community theater production of Carousel, in the children’s chorus. (Our mom was the lead, Julie Jordan). I can sing you every song from Carousel, including Billy’s Soliloquy.
We would occasionally see a high school or college production here in Winona when we first arrived – I remember WSU put on Spamalot, which was great fun. Now we volunteer as ushers during the Shakespeare Festival.
I would love to be in the chorus of any of the old Broadway musicals.
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High School theater is what got me into technical theater. And the rest is history.
I always wanted to play Hysterium in A Funny Thing Happen On the way to the Forum. I don’t sing very well though. Which kinda works for that role!
Now days it’s hard to remember my lines. I may get all the words in just not in the exact order…
I avoid HS theater. A three hour production of Fiddler killed HS theater for me. I have to really like you to go see a show now. I’m a harsh critic.
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I was in two plays in HS: Our Town and Godspell. I played Wilma in Our Town. I was in marching band, concert band, choirs, madrigal singers, chamber singers, and Da Capo Singers.
If I knew a high school student and I was invited to attend a play, I would.
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Rise and Shine, Baboons,
In high school I was a regular player in the pit orchestra when musicals came around. ( I don’t know if they even do those anymore because of pre-recorded scores?). I was also active in all things band-related: regional contests, All State tryouts and band, local musical events. I was a very busy kid between that, 4H, and family obligations.
I have occasionally attended high school events when my nieces and nephew were in performances. My own son was always part of math teams and events, but not theater, although he loves to attend theater. One of my nieces is the theater director in the Ankeny, Iowa public school program. She has all kinds of programatic challenges, but I have not been available to attend a performance that she directed. ANother niece designed and sewed costumes as a high school student. She made a stork costume that was remarkable!
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As a high school freshman I was a blind girl in a production of “The Miracle Worker” – no lines, just a brief appearance on stage. As a sophomore and junior, I was in the pit band for productions of “Lili” and “The Pajama Game”. As a senior I wanted to try out for “South Pacific”. A week before try outs began I was handed the piano score by the choir director and
told to learn it. The director and I were having a bit of a feud at that time so I was surprised he wanted me to be the pianist. I got a bit of revenge, though. A different pianist rehearsed with the pit band while I got to rehearse directly with the cast. I used the movie soundtrack to determine tempos for each song. So for the actual production, the music director tried to set his tempo but the cast was used to my tempo and the orchestra followed my lead. He didn’t look too happy but had to go along with what the band was playing.
I have been to a couple of high school musicals that my nieces were involved with. Otherwise I prefer professional productions.
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In my junior year of high school I was Anne Frank in The Diary of… I had been is a few one-act plays and enjoyed being on stage but never took it any further. I thought about it often but didn’t have the drive to go for it.
One of my cousins has been in the local theater scene in Tulsa for most of her life. She loves it and now in her seventies is taking lessons in acting for commercials and improv. Her nephew followed her into acting and majored in Theater Arts at DePaul University in Chicago. When he was in a college production of Charlotte’s Web. My mom, sister, daughters and I, his mother and all 3 of his Tulsa aunts, went to Chicago to see him. That’s the the farthest I’ve ever gone to see a play.
I go to lots of plays. My sister and I had season tickets to the Guthrie for several years, and we go to at least 2 or 3 Broadway touring shows every year and a variety of shows at smaller theaters.
Possibly Anonymous Caroline
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At the time I attended, my high school had a very good theater department, and several of my friends were involved in theater. Although I was pretty self conscious and shy, I tried out for plays a few times. With musicals, I’d get through the singing audition and fail with either dance or acting. So I turned my efforts to backstage and worked on sets, props, ticket sales, and publicity.
My only chance to act was in world literature class, when we had to perform scenes from plays. I had a part in a scene from Moliere (can’t remember which play).
When our kids were in high school, we attended plays regularly. Minnetonka high school had an excellent theater department and going to plays was there was very enjoyable. One of Son’s best friends was in their production of Les Mis, which was chosen to perform at the Edinburgh Fringe festival.
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I was never in the theatre world. I was quite the opposite…the dreaded hulking high-school football player. But now I have nieces who are deep into that world.
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