Due to COVID restrictions and other life events, it had been several years since I had taken part in one of my favorite activities: attending a high school musical. That was remedied this past Saturday night when Linda and I attended the production of one of my favorite shows, Les Miserables, at my alma mater, Central Catholic. This was joint production of Central, an all boys school, and Oakland Catholic, an all girls school two blocks up the street.
At the risk of sounding corny and trite, this production fulfilled a long held dictum of mine: If you want to feel good about today's youth and the future, attend a high school musical. The talent, the energy, and the sheer enthusiasm of the kids on stage was positively amazing. Usually, I attend the musicals staged by my home school district, North Allegheny. The enrollment at NA is over 2,700 students, and it's budget for such things is, shall we say, generous (let me show you my school tax bill). The combined enrollment at Central and Oakland Catholic is less than half of North Allegheny's, and my guess is that the budget for a musical at Central/Oakland would reflect that. For those reasons, my expectations for this production were tempered, but I have to say that those expectations were far exceeded.
The sheer talent of the kids, and there were probably at least fifty kids in total performing in the show, was off the charts, the sets were beautiful, and the costumes were amazing. As for the show, well, as I said, it has long been one of my favorites (see HERE), and the emotional wallop of this show was not lost just because it was a group of teenagers presenting it. One number that I was especially looking forward to seeing was "Master of the House." If you know the show, you know that it is the one somewhat comic number in it, and that it has its share of, shall we say, bawdy elements. How would this number be sanitized by the two Catholic schools presenting it, or would it be left out of the show entirely? Well, I am happy to say that the number was presented and staged as it was written, so BRAVO to the administrations of CC and OC for this. I cannot imagine that this would have been the case back in my late 1960's student days, and I am sure that schools in Florida won't be doing it anytime soon.
On a more personal note, it was very cool to go back to Central for this one night. I have not revisited Central all that often in the fifty-four years since I graduated, and Linda had never been there, and seeing it through her eyes was revaluation to me. The Auditorium where the play was presented was not a big deal to me, although the hard wooden seats have since been replaced by cushioned theater style seats. It was just a place where I went to some classes and attended school assemblies. Linda, however, took in the amazing architecture of the place. The brick walls and the wooden ceilings with the painted crests upon them, and saw something much different. "This is a beautiful place" she said. And indeed it is. I even got to show her my Dad's picture as a part if the first graduating class, 1931, that hangs in the center stairwell.
In closing, go see a high school musical! The season for these is coming to a close, so if you can't get to one this year, put it on your Things To Do List for 2024.
