No Small Parts

or Anna's School Play

Anna was recently in her school play.  The play was called Generations (Matthew did the same play at his school in the fall with the same director who does plays at two elementary schools in town).  She was very excited to be in the play.  She asked if she could be a prospector (because that's what Matthew was in his play) so she got to be a prospector - the only girl prospector as she liked to point out.  She told us sometimes it was difficult to deal with all those boy prospectors and was really grossed out one day when one of them sneezed in her hair.  :)  Here she is in the play, complete with a beard.  She worked really hard to learn her lines and was very animated and expressive in the play.  

I tried to get a video of her singing her solo line in the gold mining song.  Here it is.

She got to be in most of the other scenes too.  Here she is a fancy Englishwoman circa 1600.

And after the play with big brother

And little brothers

A lot of Anna's friends were in the play and she had a great time.

And a week or so after the play they had the cast party!

She was dressed up as Rey for Star Wars day.

Anna got a special award at the cast party - The Heart of the Theater Award (and this giant heart cookie made by the director).  Two kids got this award out of the hundred or so on the play and the other person who got it was one of the leads.  Anna was a little embarrassed to tell me about the award (she felt like it would be bragging) but said the director said she embodied the "pillars of character" (that the play was about and the school's core values they try to teach the kids - Respect, Responsibility, Caring, Fairness, Trustworthiness and Citizenship).  And she said the director gave an example of each pillar and something Anna did and talked about her for a long time.  So she was a little embarrassed by that too.  She shared her cookie with all of us at home.

One thing the director said is that Anna helps to clean up when other people make a mess or drop garbage even if it isn't her mess, and Anna said she does that because I make her clean up other people's messes at home too, which is true.  Poor girl.  

I used to do a lot of musical theater in elementary and middle school and our director would always tell us (after parts had been handed out), "there are no small parts, only small actors."  This piece of wisdom is applicable to life in general, not just theater.  And Anna really worked hard to be the best prospector she could and did a great job.  Way to go Anna!!