May Drama in July

I know. I've waited a ridiculous amount of time to post these, but back in May, you may recall, we did have a couple of super-cute productions going on!

The first was a musical version of Charlotte's Web. Chicklet9 played the spunky little lamb with the bossy, over-protective Sheep for a mother.

The whole barnyard was full of singing and dancing animals!

All of them required special makeup, and I enjoyed helping out on the Makeup Committee once again. Mostly I focused on Templeton the Rat.

He's also in the top picture, on the left, but I am sad to say this is the only close-up I have of him, taken with my phone in the hall after the last show. His mouth makeup has rubbed off, but normally I drew ratty pointy teeth on his lips, too. I was quite pleased with how he turned out!

I also did Chicklet's makeup, and sometimes her mommy's too. I am proud of Chicklet's curls! Her hair is stick-straight normally, but with lots of gel, sleeping in twisty rollers, and tons of hairspray, her 'do lasted more than one day. (Second day in these pics.) It helped that we got her long hair cut to shoulder length before dress rehearsal week, the better to curl it for the show.

As one of my witty friends commented, "Oh, she got a lamb chop!"

The other May production was a one-act comedy called The Seussification of Romeo and Juliet.  This one's a little more dear to my heart because I directed it!

Romeo, Romeo, baby-O, buff,
Wherefore art thou? I just can't get enough!

That's B13 as Romeo, above. Below, his good friend and look-alike wears the yellow hoodie and played Romeo in the second half of the play. Mercutio is in red and Benvolio is in orange (still sporting his red mohawk from playing the Rooster in Charlotte's Web).

There were four kisses in the script, and I tossed and turned over in my mind all the ways we could stage them. One we just eliminated; Romeo dipped Juliet instead. Another was funny as a quick "air kiss."  In another, Juliet is dead, so all the other Romeo had to do was place his hand on her cheek and lean in close without making contact. But the first kiss, at the party when they meet, was essential, and it seemed like B13 and Juliet were just going to have to do it "for real"...until in dress rehearsal, we realized that the visor, that the script calls for Romeo to wear, would serve to block the audience's view anyway!

So they are just fakin' it here. That's Juliet's Nurse, in scrubs, and the other Romeo is playing the Prince, in the red cape.

The Monotones wear "O's" on their bellies; the Capitulates wear "X's" upon thars. (From The Sneetches? "Stars upon thars"? Anyone?)

In this production, nobody dies, the Feud-Fixing Chappie takes all the X's and O's off their bellies and both families become great friends in the end. From L to R, above, standing--Lord and Lady Capitulate, Lord and Lady Monotone, Narrator 1 and 2, Narrator 3 and 4, Romeo 1 (B13) as the Prince, Juliet, and Romeo 2. In front, on the ground, we have the Prologue, the Nurse and the Servant.

The farthest right group was cut off in the other picture, but here they are--Paris/Tybalt in the blue hoodie, Mercutio in red and Benvolio in orange.

Lord Monotone also doubled as Monk Larry.  "Not Monkey Larry, he's not quite that hairy. He's just a monk, the monkiest one/That Romeo knew, who could get the job done." Here he is about to give Juliet Death-Faking Nuts.

See that bed? It's a crib mattress on top of two wheeled ottomans, all held together with bungie cords and not very stable. It gave me fits. But at least it fit in my van and we were able to practice with it a few times before the actual performance!

I learned so much from teaching this class. I not only directed, but I was prop mistress and costumer too, with help from parents and an aide. It was my first time teaching such a large group of 12-18 year-olds, and although teenagers can be challenging, I really enjoyed this group. They had a lot of energy and they liked to socialize, but they also worked hard, took direction and took initiative to develop their characters and the comedy in the script.

And I was so pleased and impressed with how my students turned up the energy when they got in front of an audience!  It was really excellent--and sad that there was only one performance. Papa Rooster took video and got hung up editing the audio, because it's a new camera/software combination. But hopefully there will be video, eventually.

At the end, after a first cast bow, with the crowd continuing to cheer...some of them bowed again, some of them boogied...

Then the whole cast cut loose!

It was a great experience.  What fun!