[dramamommy]

hi. ok, i am having auditions this week and very excited! as usual i am at a shortage of boys, so i'm wondering in previous performances have you seen male charaters turned in to female ones or played by females?

thanks!

[LisaKitty]

When we did this show in high school, they had the landlord in the hotel scene (Kringlein) and Mr. Goldstone both played by girls. Goldstone was a "drag" role, and they changed the gender of the landlord (landlady?) to be Mrs. Kringlein (and made it a non-sexual assault).

I just did the show at a community theatre, where we added some non-named Farmboys to the Dainty June number. All played by girls.

Hope that helps!

[RainbowJude]

[dramamommy]

you know david, i find it interesting when i hear replies like yours. i have seen the works of an outstanding private middle school in our area where a guest director takes the kids through the paces of shakespeare...and not only do they get it, but they excel at it.

rose is an extremely challenging and difficult role for anyone to play. complexities abound....why would you NOT allow someone the opportunity at 18 to explore that at a high school. it will be the only place they can.

[The REAL Ciaron]

[dramamommy]

in your humble little opinion ofcourse

[Salome]

No. its more than his opinion. Its also Arthur Laurents analysis of the situation. He said in an interveiw that the show should not be attempted by educational theatre because you need to live first before you can get intoi the head of these complex people.

[what_the_heck013]

Just out of curiousity, to RainbowJude and others, if musicals such as Gypsy are "too complex" for us poor, little high school students, how do you "challenge" us?

[Salome]

with shows like west side story,Titanic,Threepenny Opera, Into he Woods (though the baker's wife is very hard for a high school student to pull off)shows that are complex in nature,text,politics,emotions,but dont require alot of life lessons for the character to perform convincingly.

[what_the_heck013]

Yeah, I guess you're right, Salome. I hear my school might do WSS next year.

[The Tink]

Salome, RainbowJude and Ciaron said everything I was planning on saying. Damn. And I was looking forward to getting on my soapbox for awhile...

[caseyfaceisrad]

You know... high school students can really surprise you in terms of their quality of performance when portraying characters who have expierienced life in it's fullest in educational theatre. Recently, my school, Bunnell High School in CT, just did a production of Miss Saigon. I was a soloist and my best friends were Kim, Ellen and Chris. And I'm positive none of them have been through anything as truamatizing as the Vietnamese war. This still did not affect our performance. Richard Maltby, the co-lyricist of Miss Saigon, came to our production and said nothing but good things, wrote us all letters and gave our light designer (merely a junior) an internship over the summer working on The Pirate Queen. I didn't mean to go on a tangent, but here's my point. Anything is possible if you try. We pulled off Miss Saigon incredibly and there is word of us doing Gypsy or Little Women next year. All I'm saying is be a little more open minded when it comes to the potential of high school drama clubs and their actors.

[Salome]

Miss Saigon is pop fluff compared to Gypsy. the characters are one dimenional. unlike Mama Rose in Gypsy or Edie Beale in Grey Gardens.

[teridtiger]

[quote="caseyfaceisrad"]the Vietnamese war. [/quote]

Are you kidding me?

I WISH that was a typo. But I'm sure it was intentional.

Just as Salome stated previously, kids your age have not learned life lessons thoroughly enough to perform this type of material.

[jewel128]

im a high schooler myself and its rumored that we may be doing gypsy in the spring.
i have never seen the show, but from the soundtrack i listened to and synopsis i read, it seems that we'd need a buncha middle schoolerd (ugh) and there would be a limited chorus.
my theater friends keep saying its ideal as their are a supposed multitude of female parts?

but when i was listening to the soundtrack, i caught myself singing along to "together wherever we go" because we had sung it back in the day of elementary school choir!

[blackbird_fly]

Aside from the acting part of Gypsy, I doubt many high schoolers can sing Everything's Coming up Roses or Rose's Turn without injuring their voices. I don't sing nor I have I seen the score but to my ears Rose's solos sound very difficult.

[Patrick]

High Schools can feel free to do Gypsy, but they should understand that the performances won't be as good as with say, ItW?

But there were people in Carousel and MFL who had no clue what to do acting wise...so it depends on the school.

[jewel128]

o man, im very excited about our show
the girl who plays rose is so talented, but i think she's going to college for vocal performance, not musical theater

i wish all the people who think high schoolers cant do this show could come see us

we're known for doing challenges, we're like the best in our region
we kinda sorta look down on the schools that do the safety shows like into the woods

[SuperKabob]

Into the Woods is NOT a safety show.

[pish123c]

While a lot of high school actors are shallow performers, I think as long as there was a very strong student playing Mama Rose, Gypsy would be a very good show for a high school. She's the only character that's extremely difficult, in my opinion...And who is to say that a 17 year old couldn't come along and completely understand her? It would be rare, but you never know.

[jewel128]

for us it is

[SuperKabob]

Sorry, didn't realize you were perfect.

[jewel128]

no prob

[SuperKabob]