February 29, 2004

Solace for Teen Angst Found in Musical Theater

Filed under: Art and About Me — admin @ 4:18 pm

Crowning the walls of the chorus room at Acalanes High School are student-designed plaques commemorating the annual musicals produced by the department. Decades of choral classes comprised of hundreds of talented and creative individuals are represented by those plaques. With only a few exceptions, there is a repetition of Broadway titles that have become high school production staples over the last 50 years. A lot of Rodgers and Hammerstein classics are on that wall, and “Guys and Dolls” pops up every few years.

I was a student in that choral department from 1986-1990. “Les Misérables” was the hottest show in London and on Broadway at that time, and for me, a musical theater lover, the world was forever changed. The completely sung libretto, the romance, the violence, the emotional extremes all entranced me and the original cast recording became my constant audio companion.

I used to stand in the Acalanes chorus room and wish we could do “Les Misérables.” At the same time, it saddened me to think that someday my beloved “Les Miz” would reach the point in every big show’s life when it becomes fodder for high school students to learn the art of stage production. I would look at one of the “Oklahoma” plaques and try to imagine what that mighty show must have been like in its heyday before it became a high school musical. Then I would cheer myself up by rationalizing that “Les Miz” was far too technically difficult and too long to ever become a high school musical. Besides, if it did become a high school musical, it wouldn’t be for a long, long time.

I hadn’t thought about any of this for 14 years, and then I heard Campolindo High School was doing “Les Misérables: School Edition” as their musical this year. I couldn’t believe the time had come for teenagers to take over the story for a show that has become a Broadway legend. It was a rude awakening to realize that time had moved on and the “Les Miz” of my youth no longer existed.

I also realized that I hadn’t given “Les Miz” a lot of thought for a long time. I saw “Les Miz” 10 times over a 10 year period, and then just stopped having the need to go anymore. What changed? I thought of a comment John Lithgow once made on “The Rosie O’Donnell Show” saying that he thinks people take from the theater what they need at any given time. I completely agree with him. When I saw “Rent,” I wept for the disillusioned bohemians because I was one year out of film school and had chosen to get a real job rather than eat rice and beans in a rundown apartment in Los Angeles. Part of me envied my friends in L.A. who were still collecting rice and bean recipes, while the other part realized that I wasn’t cut out to suffer that much for my art. “Rent” was cathartic for me at that time.

I saw “Ragtime” when I was a month away from giving birth to my son. When the character of Colehouse Walker, Jr. sang, “I see his face/I hear his heartbeat/I look in those eyes/how wise they seem./ And when he is old enough I will show him America/And he will ride on the wheels of a dream,” I became a sobbing puddle on the floor of the theater. That sentiment suddenly meant much more to me than when I had seen the show for the first time three years earlier.

I have realized that “Les Miz” was my pop outlet for teen angst, providing the same function James Dean or The Doors had for previous generations. While my peers were sharing their growing pains with The Cure or Depeche Mode, I connected with a 19th century novel about revolutionary France set to music. Now, I find it wonderfully poignant that a show which served such a need in my teens and early 20s is in the hands of teenage artists. Fate is such a clever dramatist!