I'm a freshman almost done with my first year of high school and have had a lot happen. One of the most exciting things I've done is be in the musical, "Beauty and the Beast," at my school. Even as part of the ensemble, I had a lot of fun and met and befriended many new people.
I'll admit. When i was in Drama 1 first semester, I thought, "Why didn't I drop this class?" The students were horrible and the teacher didn't know how to correctly deal with everyone. In the middle of the semester, she started to reward people who followed the rules by giving them candy. This didn't work because everyone constantly stole her candy and kept acting bad. Someone even put the whole bucket of candy in his book bag once. I was able to survive, though.
When I heard that the school was doing "Beauty and the Beast," I thought that I would want to do it. It was the third and last play of the year and I wanted to see if it was worth doing plays next year, too. I know wish I did the other two plays, too.
We started practice in April. We got to know each other the first week in April, went on Spring Break the next, and our Drama teacher just happened to be out of town the next week. Family issues caused her to have to leave and not even teach for an entire week. Leads continued to practice at one person's house while the ensemble, which I was a part of, practiced our music at home.
Finally, our teacher/director was back. We had practice every day after school until six and even had practice every weekend in April. The last week in April, practice was until seven and weekend practice was extended. "Beauty and the Beast" was opened May 1, 2012 at 7 pm. There were two casts for most of the leads, excluding Babette the maid, Cogsworth the clock, and Lafou, Gaston's right-hand man.
We played "Beauty and the Beast" May 1-4 and had a blast. Everyone who saw it loved it and still talks about it. No one will ever forget the SV Players putting on the musical version of the beloved Disney movie.
You want to know the scary part? I've had dreams about the play and the people in it. Not bad ones, but I've still had dreams about it. Whenever someone says a line from or close to one in the script or a song, I automatically want to continue it on. It's a continuing joke, all the lines and songs. Everyone continuously has the songs stuck in their heads. We can't even TALK about the play without having weird flashbacks. When going through stores and we see "Beauty and the Beast" things, we go in the opposite direction before the flashbacks come up strong. Even writing this article May 23, a mere 19 days after closing night, I am having mixed emotions and weird memories of the play. Pre-show rituals, jokes on and off stage, songs, mess-ups, dance numbers, questions, friendships, post-show rituals, initiations, and a million other things are flying through my head, constantly changing to something new.
I've become friends with both other freshmen and upperclassmen because of this. I've learned that, no matter where you come from or what you want in life, there is always somewhere you belong. Drama is one place I will always be welcome at my school. All the Drama students, no matter how different we are or what we're going through, can always get together and make everything better. This is where you realize who you are and what you want to become while making friendships and having your family grow. Being part of the ensemble in "Beauty and the Beast" will definitely be something I will NEVER forget.