Tag Archives: Theater

One Act time again

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The One Act is back, with Eve on stage and Lex on lights! What a brilliant duo. The show was called Variations on a Theme and was a series of variations of how a scene at the train station could play out between a guy and a girl. The guy was at the station and each scene was him imagining a different outcome. It was cool and deeper than I was expecting as the guy worked through his feelings about their relationship coming to an end. I enjoyed it.

The cast will perform one more time at a Festival in April when many different high schools come together to perform their One Act plays. It should be interesting. Eve is excited for it. Lex will be at an FRC event that weekend, so he won’t go to the festival.

One Act

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Eve did a thing! The high school does a play called “the One Act” each year. It’s a play, not a musical, and a smaller cast. Eve and two of her friends joined this year. She had a really good time with rehearsals. The final performance was tonight. It was a really funny show!

Eve is in the middle, in the black tank top, and the one on the chair with the semaphore flags. 😂

The Addams Family

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We’ve had two weekends of amazing youth theater in a row.  Last weekend we saw a production of Newsies at the LOH. The director and musical director are both my friends and colleagues at DBS and there were a bunch of kids we knew in the cast.  Lex had originally signed up to do tech for the show, but it overlapped so completely with the high school musical that he decided not to.

This weekend was the high school production: The Addams Family!  It was hysterical and so well acted.  I loved it! Most importantly, it was lit to perfection. :)

Light Designer and Operator

They even gave him an award for it at Friday’s whole school assembly!

It says “Artist, Designer, &  Innovator of the Week Award”

The show opened with two Thursday matinees for local schools. All of the middle school went to see the show, plus many elementary classes as well.  Eve came home Thursday afternoon raving about how great it was!

I worked the concessions stand for Saturday’s show, so I got to sit in the back of the theater and watch most of it.

I bet you can’t even see the picture without hearing the tune. C’mon, snap those fingers!

Gomez and Morticia

This is Lex’s old bestie, working the sound board. The two of them have grown apart on separate teams in middle school, but I have secret wishes that they’ll become friends again. :)

Lex gave me a tour of the tech booth after the show.  He even let me take his picture. :) He’s so good to me!

The headset is called “the comm” and used to communicate with the stage manager.

It all looks pretty complicated, but he seems to have no trouble with it.

Found inside the door of the tech booth. I think it’s good advice for life in general. :)

I purchased tickets for today’s show. The plan was to bring Alan, Eve, and a friend. Eve opted out, so Alan and I went alone.  Turns out I missed one of the best scenes while setting up concessions yesterday.  I’m so glad I went again!!

It blows me away the level of youth talent in the Upper Valley.  It gives me shivers watching those kids dance and sing their hearts out! I can’t even imagine having that level of talent and confidence, especially at such a young age! I’m so happy that we can support these performances and that my own kids have these opportunities to participate in magic being made.

Middle School Musical

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The middle school musical this year is Once on This Island Jr. The original version is a TONY award winning show in Broadway.  These middle schoolers were pretty close. :)

Eve played a villager in the show and Lex worked the spotlights.  They both had fun, though Eve will deny that to her dying day.  Lex was happy that after putting in the time for the last two years, he was finally getting to do something more interesting.

See the elegant villager in the purple shirt and peach skirt? She’s my favorite villager!

Handsome tech crew!

Eve’s in the middle, towards the back. Big smile on her face!

Lex at work!

I took them to the show last night, Opening Night, and worked concessions.  Tonight Alan and Amanda went with them while I went to a free CrossFit Ladies Night. Now they are all getting ice cream and I’m home, drinking tea in my PJs.  It’s a pretty good Friday night. :)  Tomorrow is the final performance.  The highest praise I’ve heard so far came from my husband who said, “It was so great! I want to go back tomorrow night!”  Fortunately I bought a ticket for him, just in case. :)

Matilda

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Matilda: The Musical

On Wednesday Eve and I went to an audition information session for Northern Stage’s upcoming production of Matilda: The Musical.  This will be a professional production that runs through the holiday season.  In order to audition she needs to memorize a “cut” from one of the songs (they gave her the sheet music with lyrics), plus a “cut” from a contemporary Broadway musical of her choice, plus a head shot and a resume.  Upon hearing this she leans over and whispers, “What’s a resume, Mom?”  I think hers will be fairly short!

The schedule is grueling! 78 shows! They are double casting the kids so she would only have to do half of them — but still!!

I’m not sure she has the stamina for such an activity, and truthfully I’m not sure this family has the stamina for it either.  However, she is excited and we are going with that.  The director reminded the kids that he isn’t looking for “beautiful people with beautiful voices,” he’s looking for quirky kids.  Eve was happy to hear that.  :)

Auditions are June 2nd.

Off to see the wizard

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This year’s elementary drama school was The Wizard of Oz, and, of course, it was awesome!  Eve played Nikko, the leader of the flying monkeys.  She was also a crow attacking the scarecrow and a citizen of Emerald City.  She loved her roles and had a great time!

Glenda the Good Witch, Dorothy, and Toto. (#notmykids)

Dorothy and Marvel the Magician gazing into the crystal ball. (#notmykids)

My crow, stealing the straw hat off the scarecrow.

The cowardly lion was awesome! (#notmykid)

Nikko threatening the merry crew on their way to Oz.

Nikko in the background, awaiting orders from The Wicked Witch, who was also amazing!

She was exhausted at the end, but already asking me to sign her up for theater camp again this summer.

Mema, Tom, and Katie came to see the show too!  I think a good time was had by all. :)

Concerts, karate, and mini golf (oh my!)

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We are once again in a busy upswing around here. Lex had is “Concert Grande” yesterday. It was only postponed due to snow once, unlike the 6th grade concert that was postponed so many times they ended up just not doing it. We’ve had a lot of snow lately! Concert Grande is 7th-12th all together. It was fun. Lex once again dressed nicely and I, like a dope, took a few pictures in SnapChat but not the camera app and, like even more of a dope, didn’t save them to post here. Oh well. Imagine Lex at the holiday concert, only slightly taller. :)

Today he had a belt test and got his solid purple belt! He’s a powerhouse!

 

 

 

Lex is doing stage crew for the middle school play too and that will pick up in April.

Eve has several roles in the DBS play and rehearsals are in full swing. She is busy rehearsing during recess and many days after school. The play is April 12th! I’m looking forward to it!

I am elbow deep in an PTO mini golf fundraising event we are orchestrating. Each class has built a mini golf hole with a book theme. Tomorrow they will all be setting them up (in the library, which I have been prepping and clearing all week!) and Saturday families will come play 18 holes of mini golf! I’m sure it will be a blast, but right now it’s a ton of work! Being a teacher and VP of the PTO puts me right smack in the middle of all of it. Also, ’cause it’s in my space. I had eager 4th graders today clear out all the tables and chairs from the library, so now it’s a huge open space. They wanted to move bookshelves too, but I had to put a stop to that! Right now it’s 9pm and I’m brain dead from PTO work, so I thought a blog post was in order. :) If you’re local, come by and check it out. It will be awesome! The kids are SOOO excited! If you’re not local, check out pictures on Facebook. :) We might even LiveStream for awhile.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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We have this awesome program called Shakespeare In School that comes to DBS and teaches the 4th grade a play. This is the second year they have done it. The whole class participates, they practice at school for many weeks, they do a performance at school, then they get to do a performance on a real stage in a real theater! This year the kids did A Midsummer Night’s Dream and it was AMAZING!!!

Eve has been practicing and rehearsing lines and worrying and crying and telling me a hundred stories a day about this play. I’ve read lines with her at the hair salon and in bed and in the car and she’s even asked others to read lines with her too. When she got worried or nervous I reminded her of her enthusiasm after seeing Shrek and she perks back up.

Tonight was the big night!

I wanted to record the whole thing and take a billion pictures, but the Northern Stage guy said that photography was not allowed. :( It took ALL OF MY WILLPOWER to not pull out my camera! Except this one picture I took before he made that statement. ;)

Eve was amazing!! Her classmates were amazing! They were funny and loud and expressive. Everyone remembered their lines, they paused for laugh breaks, they look at the audience, and made big movements. I spent the entire play with a smile so big it hurt. I cannot believe no one recorded the whole thing! I want to watch it a thousand more time!

Here is a picture of Eve as King Oberon from the dress rehearsal (I stole it from her class’s Facebook page.)

After the show they had a little cookie and lemonade wrap party. The energy was high (adrenaline and cookies!) and everyone was happy. It was great.

I love our school and I love her class and I love our community. Life is good.

Shrek!

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Have I mentioned lately that I love our schools?!? There are so many amazing opportunities for the kids in this district, and the support they get from the teachers and parents is outstanding!

After many hard weeks and late nights (for the cast and directors especially!) Shrek! Jr, The Musical opened this weekend. I LOVE it! Lex has been coming home each night telling me about the characters and jokes and he is just alight when he talks about it. Tonight we went to see it. Sooo funny! Every year the middle school puts on a musical and every year it is outstanding! This year is no different.

The local ice cream place stayed open late tonight, just for the cast and crew. Lex is there now with a friend. Loving it! Tomorrow night is the last show and then there is a cast party until midnight! I might have to bring the boy home a bit earlier than that, but he’s excited to go for a little while. He’s growing up so fast!

The people behind the scenes!

Highs and Lows in the grocery store

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I took both kids to the grocery store tonight, after karate, before dinner. I mentally prepared myself for the experience. We were ok until the kids discovered that bagels have added sugar. Although I had warned them ahead of time, they refused to believe me until they saw the ingredients list for themselves. Lex was angry! He hit the cart, then, upon realizing that punching things hurts, he started kicking things as we walked past them. Not in any damaging way, more like a public protest. I ignored him for awhile, but once he started slamming doors to the cooler cases I told him to cut it out. I’m sure slamming those doors isn’t satisfactory anyway because they just gently close. :) Eve kept it together and actively started reading labels, looking for something, ANYTHING, she could eat! LOL. They are both so dramatic. Lex hid in the beer cases for awhile, but eventually got it together. By the time we made it to the snack food aisle they were both doing a little better. Lex discovered that dry roasted peanuts have added sugar, which set him off again, until Eve pointed out that Cheez-Its do not! Who knew?!? We talked about all the other stuff in Cheez-Its, but since our focus this month is sugar I let them buy the crackers. They needed a consolation prize by this point. LOL! In the checkout lane we discovered that Tostitos also have no sugar. In fact, Tostitos have just three ingredients: corn, vegetable oil, and salt. Not a health food, of course, but acceptable for this experiment! By the time we made it out to the car Lex was feeling good, but Eve was falling apart. Tons of tears and desperation, insisting that sugar is what keeps her going and there’s no way she can be happy without it. Basically proving my point over and over again!

Actually, even though we don’t “officially” start until February (the kids remind me of this fact regularly), we have drastically cut back this week and today was our second “no sugar” shopping trip. At family meeting on Saturday Alan and I both commented on how calm and happy Eve has been all week. She was really with it and positive and went to bed in a good mood each night. This weekend, however, brought with it birthday cookies for Alan, and a birthday party with cookies for Eve’s friend. Sugar everywhere! She crashed hard Sunday afternoon.

In other news… Believe it or not there are other things going on besides our dietary saga. Eve auditioned for the school drama club this afternoon. They are going to perform Honk, Jr. a musical version of The Ugly Duckling. She is super excited, as are 40+ other kids so we’ll see how it goes! I think everyone gets to be in the musical but only 17 get speaking parts. She is excited and eager and nervous and feeling anxious about waiting until Friday for the announcement!

Lex will also be starting drama club at the middle school this year. They are doing na production of Shrek Jr. and he will, of course, be stage crew. He is looking forward to working with a real stage and auditorium (they use the high school facilities) and he’s hoping that maybe he can do some sound and lighting as well. I think that’s typically for the older kids, but we’ll see.

Hmmm… probably more, but I’m tired so I’m going to bed now. Thank you all for the support, advice, and encouragement! I think this will be a good thing. No, I KNOW this will be a good thing and it’s actually been easier than I was expecting so far. I hope we can install some habits that last longer than the month of February. :)