IDEA #94. Go to the Spring Play at your local high school (or to whatever the seasonal play might be if you don’t happen to be in the Northern Hemisphere)

If you are already performing in or are part of the stage crew of your school play, you are already attending, but for the rest of the community school plays are an easily accessible cultural event as well as an affirmation of the creative spirit of a community.

Whether the school play of the moment is a musical–these tend to be popular in the spring–or a drama or comedy, it is probably based on a script that is familiar, even iconic, in the history and world of theater. What better way to add to one’s stock of cultural knowledge as well as to appreciate the enormous effort of the cast, crew, and faculty who have spent months putting the production together?

Purchasing a ticket and sliding into a seat for an evening’s or afternoon’s entertainment is not just about enjoying the show, which is bound to be impressive even if it’s not Broadway or even the bus-and-truck companies that roam among city theaters large and small across the country. Attending a school play is a way of acknowledging and applauding, literally, the long hours of rehearsals, interesting technical challenges analyzed and resolved, and all the joys and occasional frustrations that go with being part of a collaborative team–an ensemble. The students have worked hard, with late nights even as they begin to finish up the term’s academic work, and the adults overseeing the project have put in their own blood, sweat, and occasional tears.

So, whether they’re for Grease or A Midsummer Night’s Dream or You Can’t Take It With You or Macbeth, watch for the posters for your local high school’s spring play to appear in local shop windows and make a plan to see the show. The interested child may be inspired, and at the very least he or she and any adult companion who happens to go along will be well entertained.