May 14, 2020
By KEITH RYAN CARTWRIGHT
Rutherford County Schools
Michael Thiemann was participating in Facebook group when he saw a virtual school musical.
The production immediately captured his attention and—with a few of his own tweaks and adjustments—Thiemann, who has been at Thurman Francis Arts Academy for 13 years as a music instructor, pitched the idea to school principal Jeff McCann.
“He gave me the greenlight,” said Thiemann, who recorded a promo video talking about the project, screening an example and ultimately recruiting students to participate.
The production, The Show Must Go Online, which was conceived by the drama company Beat by Beat Press, has 21 roles listed as A through T in order of appearance and only one other role which reoccurs four times. The characters all appear for anywhere from one minute to two-and-a-half minutes.
Thiemann will be editing two versions.
One features students in grades 3-5, while the second version is made up of those in grades 6-8.
He asked each student to carefully read the entire script — some roles only called for a monologue to be read, while others also included a vocal solo — and then choose “five of your favorite parts.”
Students used an online application called Sign Up Genius to choose their prospective part.
In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Beat by Beat Press fast-tracked a “kid-friendly production” of a storyline set in present day. To date, a combination of more than 460 different schools and organizations are producing the musical.
The story opens with school being closed and an already struggling drama department having to cancel their production. Without the ticket sales, the drama instructor is told by their principal, “Sorry but without the show going on there’s just no more drama program.” Following an online meeting with his drama students, the instructor had failed to turn off his live stream which allowed the students to overhear the devasting news.
Together, they decide to stage an online production and, in the process, the students become the heroes who save the drama program.
The book is by Jessica Penzias, while David Hudson wrote the lyrics and Denver Casado wrote the music.
After screening another version, Thiemann “began tweaking (the script and production notes) and making cuts and doing things that I would like to see in our production.”
He then emailed a scene-by-scene critique to help students with ideas of filming their respective scene at home.
“I’d say, ‘Here’s where I think they could have done better and did you notice how great this looks?’” said Thiemann, who has been impressed with scenes submitted by Thurman Francis students. “Some have knocked it out of the ballpark.”
He added, “You can tell which kids are just in their room by themselves and which ones the parents were heavily involved in helping producetheir scene.”
As the county’s lone arts academy, students at Thurman Francis are accustomed to performing.
Every student is part of a combination of performance art courses — band, string, choir, dance, guitar — and mentioned that one particular student puts in 20 hours a week with a dance company outside of school.
“I’m always proud of them,” Thiemann said. “They work hard and they do a good job.
“For some of them, this is not their first time at bat. They’ve done different shows and things and talent shows and performances. … These students perform quite a bit.”
Students have until May 15 to submit their scenes and Thiemann has already begun assembling the scenes he has received and hopes to post videos of the completed musicals the week of May 18.
PHOTO PROVIDED