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The play survey
Dramatics magazine
October 2008 |
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No-o-o-o-o-o Oklahoma!?
That's about the only surprise in this year's International Thespian Society production survey, an unscientific but revealing look at what's playing on high school stages across North America. As is often the case, the new survey results aren't much different from the last survey results. Still, some observations worth making:
Increasingly over the past few years, newer tuners tailor-made for the school market -- including Disney's Beauty and the Beast, this year's top finisher with twenty-seven reported productions; Seussical: The Musical; and of course, Disney's High School Musical -- have upstaged such classics as Rodgers and Hammerstein's 1943 romance between a cocky cowboy named Curly and a demure farm girl named Laurey. (Another play survey stalwart thrown overboard this year: Cole Porter's Anything Goes.) A few mid-century hits with more modern settings and less demanding scores (Guys and Dolls, which opened on Broadway in 1950, and Bye Bye Birdie, from 1960) have held place in the top ten, but still, in this company, Grease (1972) looks like a gray-haired attendee of a high school reunion. Speaking of Grease: like a majority of the top-ten musical titles, this 1950s nostalgia trip has a well-known film version feeding its fan base.
As these trends continue, and they surely will (one word: Hairspray), it will be interesting to see which of the newer musicals with movie tie-ins stand the test of time. Little Shop of Horrors, for instance, remains vigorous after two decades of cultivation, while Footloose seems to have worn out its dancing shoes.
Non-musical plays are a different matter. Typically for the Thespian survey, old plays are popular, and older plays are even more popular. The only newcomer to the top ten this year is Jim Leonard's Anatomy of Gray, which appeared in Dramatics in 2005. (It's also published in New Plays from ACT's Young Conservatory, Volume 5.) Gray and The Diviners, another Leonard work frequently seen on high school stages, were performed at this summer's Thespian Festival in Lincoln, Nebraska.
The rest of the plays range in seniority from almost legal (Rumors, which opened on Broadway in 1988) to ageless (Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, first staged around 1595). But before chiding today's high school drama directors too harshly for choosing the same time-honored titles year after year, ask yourself: how many straight plays newly produced in the last few decades have, like You Can't Take It with You (1936), a Pulitzer pedigree, no objectionable language, and speaking roles for almost twenty people?
In the short play category, Thespian Playworks alumnus Jonathan Rand continues to dominate a lineup not much changed from last year. Allison Williams and Peter Bloedel, though, are new names.
The Thespian Society, with about 3,800 affiliated high schools, has conducted this survey of most popular plays and musicals every year since 1937. About 830 schools participated in this year's survey (down from last year's 925). They reported productions of 149 different musical titles, 431 different non-musical full-length titles, and 460 one-act titles -- a total of 1,040 different works. In addition to these titles, 229 schools reported producing student-written scripts, and 112 schools reported producing other non-published scripts. That much originality is worth some applause.
Below are the top ten titles in each category.
The top ten musicals
1. Disney's Beauty and the Beast, by Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Tim Rice, and Linda Woolverton (MTI)
2. Little Shop of Horrors, by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken (MTI)
3. Guys and Dolls, by Frank Loesser, Abe Burrows, and Jo Swerling (MTI)
4. (tie) Seussical: The Musical, by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (MTI)
4. (tie) Thoroughly Modern Millie, by Richard Morris, Dick Scanlan, and Jeanine Tesori (MTI)
6. (tie) Bye Bye Birdie, by Michael Stewart, Lee Adams, and Charles Strouse (Tams-Witmark)
6. (tie) Into the Woods, by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine (both standard and junior versions) (MTI)
8. (tie) Disney's High School Musical, by David Simpático and others (MTI)
8. (tie) Once Upon a Mattress, by Mary Rodgers, Marshall Barer, Jay Thompson, and Dean Fuller (Rodgers and Hammerstein)
10. Grease, by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey (Samuel French)
The top ten full-length plays
1. You Can't Take It With You, by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart (Dramatists Play Service)
2. The Crucible, by Arthur Miller (Dramatists Play Service)
3. The Diary of Anne Frank, by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett (elevated in this year's survey by Wendy Kesselman's recent adaptation) (Dramatists Play Service)
4. (tie) Arsenic and Old Lace, by Joseph Kesselring (Dramatists Play Service)
4. (tie) A Midsummer Night's Dream, by William Shakespeare (PD)
4. (tie) The Odd Couple, by Neil Simon (both male and female versions) (Samuel French)
7. (tie) The Curious Savage, by John Patrick (Dramatists Play Service)
7. (tie) Rumors, by Neil Simon (Samuel French)
9. Our Town, by Thornton Wilder (Samuel French)
10. (tie) Anatomy of Gray, by Jim Leonard, Jr.
10. (tie) The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde (PD)
10. (tie) The Miracle Worker, by William Gibson (Samuel French)
The top ten short plays
1. Check, Please, by Jonathan Rand (Playscripts, Inc.)
2. Hard Candy, by Jonathan Rand (Playscripts, Inc.)
3. (tie) The Actor's Nightmare, by Christopher Durang (Dramatists Play Service)
3. (tie) 15 Reasons Not to Be in a Play, by Alan Haehnel (Playscripts, Inc.)
5. Check, Please: Take 2, by Jonathan Rand (Playscripts, Inc.)
6. This Is a Test, by Stephen Gregg (Dramatic Publishing)
7. Bang, Bang, You're Dead, by William Mastrosimone (bangbangyouredead.com)
8. The Seussification of Romeo and Juliet, by Peter Bloedel (Playscripts, Inc.)
9. (tie) Drop Dead, Juliet!, by Allison Williams (Theatrefolk)
9. (tie) Words, Words, Words, by David Ives (Dramatists Play Service)
Article by Julie York Coppens; results compiled by Jhon Marshall
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