A VTA Cinderella Story for the Ages
Since our return from Scotland, MainStage has been anything but quiet. We're about to fire up the blog again as we embark on the road once more, but in the meantime, there's no better way to catch you up than with this article by Lachlan, written for the online Chronicle. -MLO'C
It was a Thursday, a month out from VTA and nothing was working. Meg and Tim put it to us straight: we could either make this special or we could waste our potential. After that day we never looked back. People came early, stayed late, came on Saturdays, came back early from parents weekend, the whole lot. After that Thursday rehearsal the show gained a new spark of life every day. We were headed to Norfolk with two goals: to make people laugh, and make the top 10.
The night before we left there was the traditional lighting of the golden gnome (in reality, it’s just a yellow gnome with a candle wick). The whole cast spoke, and everyone spoke clearly. We were going as a family. Our show came around with the usual nerves and to no fault of our own, we had a rough start. Every cast member was on stage for the opening scene and from the darkness of the crowd one of the backstage voices shouted “Hold Please.” A light had blown, and with nerves still tickling our hands and feet we had to stand in front of a full house. Frozen. It took half a minute of standing stationary in front of a full house before we were able to continue with the show. Every single person kept composed, and poured out everything on stage. Something felt strange, and I had no idea what it was. My mind at the time assumed I was having an off show, something that happens every once and a while to actors. We had come all this way to make people laugh, and to my delighted surprise I discovered at the end we did so much more. By the time we walked off the stage the entire audience was on their feet. We had a standing ovation. I personally had no idea what had just happened; the show went by so fast, but I knew it had been special.
Mixed emotions were present for the awards show the night after. Best Ensemble--group that worked the best as a unit--went to Episcopal High School. Best Costumes: Episcopal High School. All State Cast: Lenin Cruz and Julia Messenger –as well as some Australian guy- [Lachlan is being too modest, here; he was recognized with an All-State Cast Award! -ed.] In the highest acting award category, Best Actress: Brooke Webb. Then came the honorable mentions. Hands were being held, some more tensely than others. Shoutout to my twin, Roysworth, my handholding buddy. And then the Honorable Mention plays were announced. Our goal was to be on that list, and we weren’t. Immediately after, they read the names of the Finalists; the Top 6: EPISCOPAL HIGH SCHOOL.
To say we were hype is like saying Australians like to party – it is a massive understatement. However partying was one thing we couldn’t do that night. We missed the VTA Costume party- and theater kids love costumes- but it was a sacrifice we had to make for the sake of getting some sleep. The order of performance was pulled out of a hat and we got to perform second to last. The first performers had to be up at 4:30am, but we got to sleep in until 7:00am for our stage walk through. By this point it was settled, we had done more than we could have dreamed of.
I myself wasn’t even nervous for our Sunday morning show, just excited. The first show was cool, but this was something else. More than 500 people watched as we performed what our director Meg described as “truly amazing.” We had the performance of our lives, on the biggest stage in the state. It really was indescribable. After we quickly changed in shifts in the only room the hotel had let us extend our check out in, we came back downstairs and waited for the winners to be announced. 3rd place “Wiley and the Hairy Man,” the show we’d seen the day before and knew was going to be tough to beat. 2nd place “Comedy of Errors.” We were going to SETC!
I wouldn’t have believed you if you told me that three days earlier we were going to make it this far. We beat the odds and now the journey will continue. No one saw us coming, not even ourselves, and we will never forget VTA because of it.
