This comes courtesy of NPR. Lots of fascinating stuff here...
The most frequently produced plays and musicals by high schools organized by decade
Updated On: 7/31/15 at 03:23 PM
Really interesting- and not terribly surprising that many of the most oft-produced plays are older, since the trend in plays has overwhelmingly moved toward smaller casts.
And I'm surprised Into the Woods only cracked the top 10 in this decade.
Where is the list that takes account of all the illegal productions of Wicked and Frozen?
Lion King Jr. is coming for their weaves
Anyone know why "A Midsummer Night's Dream" became so popular all of a sudden? It didn't even rank in the forties or fifties, but begins to climb the charts until it tops the list in the 2000s. It has a big cast, and a lot of the male roles could probably be performed by females, but it's so much older than any of the other titles ranked. I think it's a good thing to expose high schoolers to the Bard, and this title's a good choice, but it seems to pop on the list out of nowhere.
No wonder my college students always groaned aloud when they saw ON THE TOWN on my syllabus. I promise they didn't end up with that attitude. There's a lot going on in Grover's Corners that most high school productions ignore.
I'm kind of shocked West Side Story isn't on this list under the 2000's-2010's. In my area, at least one school decides to do it. It's so overdone this year, in fact, that there was a separate group for all the award winning Tonys and Marias at our local theatrical award ceremony. It's getting just a tad bit ridiculous, but some people just never get bored with it.
Chicago is starting to go the same way. There have been four schools do Chicago in the last 2 years.
I played Lou Martin in our high school production of Up The Down Staircase and was also in Fiddler.
Illegal productions of Wicked and Frozen? How awful. Really, there are other teen-friendly shows out there...both better ones AND ones that won't get your school sued.
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/9/15
I too was surprised not to see west side story. I thought everybody did that in high school!
Ah, THE CURIOUS SAVAGE. We've come a long way, baby.
I laughed when I saw that Bye Bye Birdie was the number one musical for two decades. I think it was the only musical my high school did when I was there.
This is pretty interesting... I find it funny that my old high school and the school district(just graduated!) have done so many shows that are on this list
Stand-by Joined: 7/17/13
i am surprised no anything goes
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/30/09
I know that West Side Story is generally understood to be a staple of high school drama programs, but I have never actually known anyone whose high school did the show. It requires a lot of men with dance ability, and so few high schools have that.
It's nice to see lots of very strong shows that can really inspire a love of theatre on this list. However, seeing favorites of mine produced so commonly also makes me very nervous--as Gaveston said, there's nothing like a weak high school production to turn you off from a really great play.
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