The complexities of love at a 1950s high school will come to life on the stage of Mineola High School next weekend when eighth and ninth graders present “Grease”.
The show will be the first musical staged at the high school featuring only eighth and ninth grade actors in the first year eighth graders are attending the high school.
“‘Grease’ draws attention to itself. Kids like it. Adults like it. It was a good inaugural show,” said show director Matthew DeLuca, who teaches at the Mineola Middle School. “It offered many opportunities for parts. I knew we had the talent. I just didn’t know who was going to grow into the parts.”
DeLuca said he thought “Grease” would give the young actors a chance to have better parts in a high school production where they wouldn’t be competing with upper classmen.
The play calls for a large cast and the Mineola production will include 40 student actors.
“Grease” tells the story of high school kids who are part of a 1950s working class subculture known as greasers, but the Mineola high school actors all said they could relate to the social situations represented in the plot.
“It’s easy to relate to, relationships and stuff,” said Jack Gorman, an eighth grader who plays Danny Zuko.
He said it’s fun playing one of the lead roles, but he is also enjoying the experience of rehearsing with his schoolmates.
“I like being with all the people, being in this environment. It’s my favorite thing to do. It’s a fun process seeing it all come together,” Gorman said.
The actors are all familiar with the musical from the movie that featured John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John.
Gorman said he’s seen it “like 100 times” and freshman Brittany Hernandez, who plays Sandy Dumbrowski, figures she watched it 30 times while growing up in North Carolina.
She performed in “Oklahoma” in school in North Carolina and said she’s excited to have a lead role in a musical in her first year in school in Mineola.
“It’s really fun. I was really familiar with it. I always liked the music,” she said.
Hernandez said she has career aspirations to perform on stage.
“I love being onstage. I want to pursue musical theater in my career,” she said.
Jilian Palma, an eighth grader who plays tough girl Betty Rizzo, said she also has professional aspirations to become an actor. She said she’s been dancing since she was three years old and started taking private singing lessons this year.
“This is what I like doing,” she said.
Palma said she enjoys playing Rizzo because the character bears no resemblance to herself.
“It’s kind of my opposite character so it’s fun to play,” Palma said.
Zachary Sloan, an eighth grader who plays Kenickie, said he’s thoroughly enjoying his first experience performing in a stage play.
“It’s just fun being involved in such a big production. Just being able to hang with your friends and doing something you all like is great,” Sloan said.
The student actors appear to be having a lot of fun in the high-energy dance numbers they perform in the show, especially the hand jive dance they perform early in the play.
“A lot of them know the hand jive,” said choreographer Barbara Peters, a speech pathologist at the Meadow Drive School. “A lot of them are theater kids so they know ‘Grease’, the movie.”
She said the most challenging thing about the show is getting the students together for rehearsals because of the numerous activities they’re involved in at the high school.
They’ll all be present and ready to go when the curtain goes up on “Grease” in the Mineola High School auditorium on Friday, May 17 at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday, May 18 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $10 at the door.
