‘HSM:’ The start of something big

Mountain Island Charter School’s drama department testifies to the creativity hardship can spark. The 5-year-old school is moving from a temporary location to a still unbuilt permanent home. As a result, this musical had only one week to rehearse in its performance space, the freshly constructed gymnasium, atop a makeshift stage assembled with repurposed wood from the old structure.

Faced with such adversity, the MICS theater department pulled off an impressive first full-length musical: David Simpatico’s “High School Musical,” based on the Disney Channel movie. The indubitably fun production involved 40 percent of the upper school’s student body and featured its first entirely student-run crew.

The show was sprinkled with several standout moments, such as the remarkable dance solo by Megan Pickett, who captained the dance team and assisted with much of the show’s choreography, or the refreshingly jazzy voice of Cassie Alexander as Ripper.

Kendall Ellis (Sharpay) and Antonio Brown (Zeke) kept the audience laughing with their deft use of improvisation and personality to fill holes, covering for jammed doors and missed cues with in-character hilarity.

Notably, this was many of the cast members’ first musical, including leads Najeer Baker and Antaria Phillips as Troy and Gabriella. Baker’s status as a real-life Troy helped him add charisma to the role; this past year, he played running back and linebacker for the MICS football team. Unfortunately, while he understood his character well, he was vocally overparted and struggled to sing the role.

Phillips’ slight unfamiliarity with her harmonies as Gabriella was fully forgivable; she was pulled into the role more than halfway through the production process. The original actress unexpectedly moved, her understudy dropped out, and the cast was left without a female lead. After frantic internal auditions were held, Phillips was recast from her prior role of Taylor, which was then splendidly filled by Jay Wideman.

This show was not a spectacle. It did not boast a fat budget or unprecedented star power. It was a high school musical in its most basic, natural form: A group of passionate teenagers and determined adults gathered limited resources to create an elevating experience for the community.

The real success of the show was captured in a fleeting moment after the bows, as the audience began to filter out. A small group of gleeful, beaming girls no older than 6 overtook Phillips, shouting eagerly for their mothers to take their pictures with “Gabriella.” That magical, inspirational enthusiasm is precisely what a high school musical is meant to create, and what the MICS theater department’s “High School Musical” did fabulously.

This story was originally published May 6, 2015 at 4:05 PM with the headline "‘HSM:’ The start of something big."