School Musical: Beauty and the Beast

Many months of hard work was realised in Week 4 of this term with three triumphant performances of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast at the Clocktower Centre in Moonee ponds.  There was amazing support from the school community with our best ever audience numbers seeing the shows being tantalisingly close to selling out.  The 100 students involved in the production rose to the occasion of performing to such a receptive audience in a professional venue and delivered consistently high level performances each night. We were fortunate to have such a breadth of talent across our leads with Lily Bell as Belle, Lohan Perera as Beast, Shreyansh Dasari as Gaston, Ben Saville as Lumiere, Bec Parnis as Mrs Potts, Arden Macaulay as Cogsworth, Ana Bhushan as Chip, Grace Dimock as Madame de la Grande Bouche, Anise Gokavi-Whaley as Babette, Marc Wijesinghe as Maurice, Eve Becker as LeFou and Cami Luu playing many characters.  The ensemble of forty students also astonished with tightly choreographed dance routines and powerful musical numbers.

Whilst the talent on stage was apparent to all, so much of what went on behind the scenes was also student driven.  Costumes worked tirelessly throughout the production season, creating the costumes and enabling the makeup and quick changes that made the show so visually stunning.  Special mention has to go to Costumes Captain Lina More in Year 12 who amongst many others made all three of Belle’s dresses - including the stunning ball gown! The ten piece student band; something that many schools are not fortunate enough to have, performed the score to a high standard and spent countless hours in rehearsal and individual practice. There were also twenty five students in Backstage Crew who created most of the set and props and moved all of the set pieces on the night, controlled the lighting, sound and even sold programs.  The oil that kept the wheels turning though was most definitely our student Stage Managers - Finlay Paatsch, Alex Bradshaw Allen and Anais Ferrando who took on significant responsibility throughout the entire process and as calm models of efficiency directed proceedings so that their peers were set up for success.

Musical is a fantastic chance for students to come together across year levels and to grow and develop from year to year.  For some Year 12s it was their fourth or fifth production and most encouragingly for the future; there were many fresh faces involved.  It was also wonderful to see the large number of Year 9s who enthusiastically travelled from Lonsdale to Story Street twice a week for rehearsals and appreciated the opportunity to connect with year levels above and below.  Programs like this serve as a reminder of the heights young people can achieve when they are set high goals and given the opportunity and agency to strive towards them. Seeing the well deserved pride that all involved felt at the conclusion of the production only served to reinforce just how important it is that we continue to provide these opportunities to our students. 

Lachlan Ridge - Musical Production Manager