High school plays - what shows are you doing and have you done?

[fiona]

Let's see...
The Hollow
The Sound of Music
Rumors
The Lunatic, The Lover, and The Poet (Comedic/Romantic Shakespeare selection)
Hello, Dolly!
Almost, Maine
The Dining Room
Legally Blonde

...all mainstage. This doesn't include student directed shows, dance collectives, and a slew of orchestra and band concerts I babysat a mic for. I also did a community production of The Nutcracker last year, made a decent buck for two weeks of inhumane hours and a practically intravenous caffeine drip.
I'm presently gearing up for a community production of Spamalot before heading off to school in the fall.
Compared to some of these lists mine looks tiny and insignificant

 

[Jakepugh15]

Romeo And Juliet Almost Maine (minus the gay scene) Frankenstein The Mouse Trap Taming Of The Shrew Bus Stop The Rainmaker You Cant Take It With You Is There A Doctor In The House Twelth Night Hiding in the open

 

[ThomasMilham]

Schools Plays...lets see..
Since I was in Year 8 in 2011-
2011 - Macbeth (School Production) - Assistant Lighting
2012 - Sweeny Todd (YR 12 Production) - Audio
2013 - The Terrible Infants (Adelaide Fringe) - Audio
- Twelve Angry Jurors (YR 12 Production) - Audio/Lighting

Thats just the school productions, although I have been tech. for other shows at school...

 

[LightingGirl]

Well, for fall plays these have been done: Noises off, Father of the Bride, Witness for the Prosecution, and Robin Hood
the musicals that have been done are these: Annie, A funny thing happened on the way to the forum, Once upon a Mattress, and Joseph and the amazing technicolor dreamcoat

 

[TheaterEd]

Almost Maine (minus the gay scene)

The school I just left did Almost Maine and left that scene it. The students (two straight males) did a great job and I have a lot of respect for them being able to perform that for their peers and family. The show we did before that was Legally Blonde: The Musical where they did cut the song Gay or European.
I just did a production of Aida with this new school and loved it. I had never heard of the show coming into the design process but after working on it I would definitely recommend it as a high school production.

 

[Aakburns]

I just got done doing a production of Grease.

 

[dsullivan]

I have directed several plays that have good female roles--The Ash Girl ( Cinderella story, but with a twist--includes the 7 Deadly Sins), Radium GIrls--about the girls who painted the radium on watches so they would glow in the dark--they get sick--want compensation from the company), To See the Stars ( about the shirtwaist factory girls who go on strike in NYC in 1909). I am always looking for more suggestions for good plays with more female than male roles. My students want to do a comedy, but there aren't many for larger (20-22) casts that are truly funny without being too corny. Any ideas?

 

[Brayidur]

I just recently Graduated. We were fairly well off funding wise, with a good administrative staff so we could get away with a lot. In order Freshman to Senior year we went

Once Upon A Mattress
Grease

The Wedding Singer
Guys And Dolls

Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
Thoroughly Modern Millie

Almost, Maine ( The only play we did )
West Side Story

However part way through my junior year, a new theatre group formed within the school, utilizing the much smaller black box venue we have, we have 3 venues, an old platform proscenium stage in a cafeteria that we do not use, its only used for a few things throughout the year none of them theatrically related, a black box, and our main-stage proscenium. They only do straight plays, and the two shows they did were originals and I personally was not involved

 

[mikeschulz530]

We always do a fall play and spring musical.

25th Anual Putnam County Spelling Bee & Beauty and the Beast
Neil Simons Rumors & Hairspray
Lend Me A Tenor & Legally Blonde

This year we're doing Arsenic and Old Lace... ( not sure on the musical yet)
in the past, they have done Clue, Bye Bye Birdie and Noises Off, just a few I can remember.

 

[MKeck]

Since 2000:
Musicals
The Wiz 4x
West Side Story 2x
It Ain't Nothin But The Blues
Beehive
Grease 2x
Once on This Island 2x
School House Rock Live
Dreamgirls
The Color Purple

Plays
All in the Timing 2x
Voices from the High School 2x
The Laramie Project
The Boys Next Door
Fences
Dearly Departed
For Colored Girls... 2x
The House of Blue Leaves
The Real Inspector Hound 2x
The Colored Museum 2x
Tracks 2x
Our Town

 

[CraigV]

My high school does three shows a year (one student-directed) and the middle school does 1 musical per year.

What I can remember of the shows that have been done (some from just seeing posters around the theater/people talking about them):

Before my time & Middle School:
- Our Town
- The Laramie Project
- Cabaret
- Grease
- Seussical
- Honk
- Oklahoma
- Annie
- Alice in Wonderland

The ones I did:

- Musical Comedy Murders of the 1940s
- Urinetown
- Plots & Eden (two 1-acts by the same playwright)
- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
- A Chorus Line
- As You Like It
- Fahrenheit 451
- Pippin
- New Voices (6 ten-minute plays)
- You Can't Take It With You
- Fame
- Brothers Grimm Spectaculathon
- Imaginary Invalid
- Tommy
- Dialogues of the Gods
- 12 Angry Jurors (12 Angry Men but allowing for women to be in it too)
- A Midwinter Night's Dream (Midsummer but performed in the winter)
- Footloose (which is still in rehearsal)

Other productions I have worked on that would be fun at a high-school level:

- Lucky Stiff
- The Drowsy Chaperone
- The Beaux' Stratagem

 

[Stacy Brown]

We've done Lindsay Price's version of The Canterbury Tales. So good! Just be creative with the staging of the Miller's Tale. We also really liked Death by Chocolate and this year's Circus Olympus (also by Lindsay Price).

 

[np18358]

Here is a list of the shows my school has done in the last ten years:
2004: Nine Armenians* and Ragtime
2005: Dames at Sea* and Of Mice and Men
2006: Trojan Women* and The Secret Garden
2007: As You Like It* and Ain't Misbehavin'
2008: Our Town* and West Side Story
2009: FAME: The Musical* and 45 Seconds from Broadway
2010: Crazy for You and The Last Night of Ballyhoo
2011: Noises Off and Hairspray
2012: Midsummer* and Metamorphoses
2013: Raisin in the Sun and Guys and Dolls
2014: Lend Me A Tenor and Legally Blonde

* Indicates a production that was mainstaged at the Florida State Thespian Festival

 

[ThatsoundguyChris]

I've worked on Legally Blonde and The Wiz and did Hercules in middle school

 

[cmckeeman]

Shows for this previous school year were
Night of the Living Dead (not the famous one)
You Can't Take It With You

 

[DLee]

I've been directing plays in a high school setting for 14 years. Here are some we have done. (non-musical)

Noises Off
To Kill a Mockingbird
12th Night
Over the Tavern
Picasso at the Lapin Agile
Our Town
You Can't Take it With You
Inherit the Wind
The Real Inspector Hound
Dancing at Lughnasa
Rumors
Hard Times
Midsummer
Miracle Worker
Dylan (About Dylan Thomas)
All My Sons
Diary of a Scoundrel
Diary of Anne Frank
Cripple of Innishman
Marvin's Room
Earnest
Crucible
Madwoman of Chaillot
The Time of Your Life
Brighton Beach Memoirs

 

[Rory McMahon]

I've only recently been doing school productions (taking a step out off touring whilst getting a degree!).

I don't have a say in what productions the school I work with do but they seem to be very successful...

We Will Rock You - This I can imagine being quite expensive but they provided everything you needed (slideshows, cue sheets, scripts, etc.)
The Lion King
Grease
Blood Brothers - as a stage play not as the musical
Return of the Forbidden Planet
Adrian Mole - Stage play
High School Musical
Legally Blonde - (this only worked as there were 2 boys in the group)
Fame
Stomp

The school do a high turnover of productions due to a number of Performing Arts groups, Whole School productions and various grading requirements. Budgets always vary, a lot rely on pupils actually doing fundraising!

From a technical point of view I try make it as visually exciting as possible, then if more people compliment it then there is hope on a stronger tech budget for the next one!

 

[CunkyMunky]

I got 'volunteed' to help with school productions a few years back. Someone told the powers that be that I teched my daughters dance school shows, ran the sound etc etc. So far, I've done;

2014 Hairspray (still in rehearsal)
2013 Chicago (first UK high school to be given the rights)
2012 We will rock you
2011 Rent
2010 Les Mis

I've also helped a colleague on Miss Saigon, Phantom & Chess

Any ideas what we could do next year? (Only proviso is that it must be a musical and something that would appeal to both the kids, parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, cats, dogs and pet rocks)

 

[Rory McMahon]

I got 'volunteed' to help with school productions a few years back. Someone told the powers that be that I teched my daughters dance school shows, ran the sound etc etc. So far, I've done;

2014 Hairspray (still in rehearsal)
2013 Chicago (first UK high school to be given the rights)
2012 We will rock you
2011 Rent
2010 Les Mis

I've also helped a colleague on Miss Saigon, Phantom & Chess

Any ideas what we could do next year? (Only proviso is that it must be a musical and something that would appeal to both the kids, parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, cats, dogs and pet rocks)

Blood Brothers is a good one. (The musical. Not stage show). I've only done the stage show before but I've seen the musical. Great songs and good humour for all!

 

[twalker1998]

I have been a part of:
Frankenstein (our own adaptation)
Shrek the Musical
A Murder At The Regency (our own dinner theatre show)
A Midsummer Night's Dream
Curious Savage
Arsenic and Old Lace

I will be a part of this year:
Peter and the Starcatcher (our own adaptation)
Sherlock Holmes (our own two part adapatation-our fall show will end on a cliff hanger to be continued in our spring show)
Addam's Family The Musical
The Tempest
A Murder At The Regency (again, our own dinner theatre show)
Clue (our own adaptation)

Shows that my theatre department has done but I wasn't a part of:
Neverwhere (our own adaptation)
The Ugly Duckling
The Illusion
Frank and Rita
MacBeth
CATS
Flowers for Algernon
Thoroughly Modern Millie
Beauty and the Beast
Noises Off
Into The Woods
Les Misérables
West Side Story
The Wizard of Oz
Flanagan's Wake
Spelling Bee
Rumors
The Diviners
The Insanity of Mary Girard (our own adaptation)
Annie
Fiddler On The Roof

and many more that I'm forgetting. We also participate in numerous improv shows and other acting festivals throughout the year.