Perhaps it’s fitting that a high school musical delayed four months by a global pandemic should focus on the paradoxical nature of life and love: how we find the balance between what’s safe and what’s scary, between taking chances or going with the known, and searching for something more versus staying still.
Iola High School drama students performed a musical, “The Theory of Relativity,” in front of a small, socially distanced crowd of family at the Bowlus Fine Arts Center Friday evening. The play originally had been scheduled for early April, but was postponed when schools were closed because of the coronavirus.
The play is college-level material, with themes you don’t often find in a high school play: homosexuality, pregnancy and abortion, grief and sacrifice. It tells of the transition between childhood and adulthood, as young people leave the safety of home and venture into the thrilling and difficult adventures ahead.
Friday’s performance was a bittersweet experience, made even more poignant by the young IHS actors who tapped into the angst of delayed gratification.
The cast practiced for four weeks before the play was postponed, waited four months and then pulled it all together in just nine rehearsals. But on Friday, you would have thought they’d kept practicing the entire time, with barely a hiccup.
The play introduced its cast in a whirlwind of two group numbers, before settling into a series of musical vignettes, usually solos or duets. The stage was bare except for a backdrop of twinkling lights and chairs, which they used as props in some of the song and dance numbers.
Michael Price kicked off the individual numbers with a lighthearted number about how difficult it is to find love when “I’m Allergic to Cats,” and the perfect woman is, of course, a cat person.
Much later, we hear from his paramour, Macie Hoag, as she gently yet hilariously breaks the news of her engagement to her five cats in “Julie’s Song.”
Isabella Duke and Jonathon Poffenbarger traded a series of short monologues throughout the play.
Duke’s touching story, “Cake,” was punctuated with dramatic hand gestures and quiet moments of self-reflection as she battled through neurosis to learn to accept the love that has been offered to her in the form of a cake.
We see a similar struggle faced by the serious and nerdy Poffenbarger. He’s a bit more cerebral as he tries to quantify his emotions with references to the mathematical constant and irrational number, “Pi.”
In “The End of the Line,” Haley Carlin and Kaylin Klubek sing and dance the way best friends do as they recap the evolution of their relationship. Everything was fine when they were young and their roles more clearly defined. But their friendship ends when they get older and things change.
Hanna Andersen and Dalton Muntzert tackle the “Great Expectations” parents have for their children. With sadness and regret, yet full of hope, Andersen and Muntzert realize they must follow their own paths.
The ever-exuberant yet tender River Hess previews what’s to come for many of the recent IHS graduates. In “Footprints,” we follow his character through college. He knows he can always return to the comfort and safety of his family and home, only to find things changing with every visit. His dog died. His sister eloped. His parents divorced. And, eventually, he comes to see how he has changed and grown as well.
Haley Carlin and Austin Morris bump into each other in “Lipstick,” revealing their very different expectations.
Morris returns to play a different character who falls for Adryan Nading in the provocative “Apples and Oranges.” Sweet and kind, Nading always felt something was wrong with him because he never liked apples, until he meets the adorable Morris and they discover a mutual love of oranges. Yes, those are homosexual metaphors.
