Welcome to The Conservatoryʼs spring musical and Fringe production! I first discovered "... Spelling Bee" back in 2005 when it became a Tony award winning hit on Broadway. A few years later I took my Advanced Scene Study class on a fi eld trip to see the show and we all fell in love with the authentic, quirky characters and hilarious and touching plot. I eagerly waited for the perfect Harker cast and the perfect time to direct the show myself - and here we are!

This summer, The Conservatory musical theater program is thrilled to be one of only 33 high schools across the world selected to perform at The Edinburgh Festival Fringe with the American High School Theater Festival. I knew this group of students and this show were the perfect choice for a "Fringe year." The show follows an eclectic group of six mid-pubescents vying for the spelling championship of a lifetime. While candidly disclosing funny and touching stories from their home lives, these charming characters spell their way through intense competition, hoping, as the show's description words it, "never to hear the soul-crushing 'ding' of the bell that signals a spelling mistake. Six spellers enter; one speller leaves a champion and all are changed forever." The story is simple, funny, poignant and beautiful. The show has been performed at every local high school in the Bay Area for decades. Yet, for some strange reason it has been the focus of controversy this year when a school board in Ohio tried to ban a high schoolʼs production. Why? Because one of the children in the show has two gay dads. And because another sings about the drama of his awkward puberty moments. And a third sings about how they are "not that smart" because their family tells them so, and struggles to find their own strength without their family's validation. Just last week, NPR wrote an article about the "controversy" in Ohio. Check it out.

I certainly didn't select "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" to provoke, and I am shocked and bewildered that there are those in our country wishing to censure theater and storytelling at all, much less a tenderhearted show like "The Bee." A quote in the NPR article sums it up nicely:

"Theater is about more than just getting on stage and singing a song and dancing a dance," said student Riley Matchinga. "It's about making people think critically and think about life in ways that you wouldn't on a day-to-day basis, and empathize with people."

"Spelling Bee" simply reflects, in the most tender and hilarious of ways, the life of a wonderful group of perfectly imperfect children. Enjoy the incredible work of this incredible cast!

– Laura DeKraker Lang-Ree
Director of Performing Arts, K-12