The gods of Mount Olympus were in our favor Thursday, Friday and Saturday as over 150 students produced and performed in Talent Show 2k14: An Epic, which lived up to its name.
This year’s show was another showcase of Whitman’s widespread musical talent. There were 22 musical acts with fewer repeated faces than previous years—something director Carson Lystad said he has always wanted to change.
The ancient Greek theme was expressed through both the skits and the musical numbers. Even during auditions, it seemed like people had thought about the theme and tried to incorporate it into their acts, Lystad said. Many acts included costumes inspired by ancient Greece, like the opening act, “Runaway Baby,” which featured Poms dancers dressed as Greek goddesses.
There were also more underclassmen on stage than in past years. For example, the band “Orpheus,” who performed “Say Something” by A Great Big World, was exclusively comprised of freshmen and sophomores.
Music director Joey Williams said the heavily incorporated Greek influences made the show more cohesive and harder for audience members to pick favorites. Williams said the directors knew from the beginning that the show would be longer than usual because there were so many talented acts that tried out. But all selected acts maintained a constant high energy, he said.
“There were no deadweight acts and no filler acts,” Williams said.
The show encompassed a wide variety of musical styles. Lead vocalist Weston Slaughter rapped “Faithful” by Common with remarkable confidence. The following act, “Hallelujah,” featured a 12-member orchestra conducted by freshman Alistair Coleman. Other bands performed indie, pop and rock, taking advantage of the plethora of talented instrumentalists and vocalists.
Drumline showcased its creativity by ditching their drums for a majority of their act, instead creating beats by sweeping and hitting the ground with brooms, stomping their feet, ripping paper and drumming on recycling bins and orange plastic buckets. Eventually they brought their drums out and engaged the audience in the all-time favorite cadence “1, 2, 3, 4, let’s get busy.”
Lystad also praised the talented tech crew, comprised of set designers Hailey LaRoe and Harry Cash and lighting director Niels Verhoeven, for pulling together amazing visual effects despite the time crunch caused by snow days and “Lord of the Flies.” The acting portion of this year’s show, under the direction of seniors Kate Goldberg and Adam Joel, followed the story of a group of clueless students assigned a project on ancient Greece. They decided to travel back in time to learn about it firsthand.
“This year, we focused more of our writing on the ancient Greek theme because we didn’t want to use too many overused Whitman jokes,” Joel said.
As it turns out, ancient Greek Whitman was not so different from modern day Whitman. In one skit, mothers trained their students for the Whitman Olympics and requested an AP level of high jump to get their children ahead. Teachers taught lessons on the Prometheus, and tried to avoid the attendance office “monster,” while girls swooned over the “sirens”—English teacher Matthew Bruneel, math teacher Tyler Wilkinson and social studies teacher Peter Kenah.
The last musical act before the finale of the show was “Bohemian Rhapsody,” performed by senior Katherine Paterson. Along with several male backup singers cloaked in black hoods for a majority of the number, Paterson performed the classic song with unmatched energy and intensity. Lystad played a guitar solo towards the end of the number, which roused a huge applause from the audience.
Sophomore Caroline Evans said she was incredibly impressed by this year’s show, and thought it lived up to expectations.
“It was actually epic,” Evans said.
