Students put a new twist on Broadway classic

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South Side Middle School students Jacob Bolanos, Brendan Duffy, Caitlin Ferrari, Quinn Galvin, Jimmy Gillen, Matthew Lindsay, Lena Miller, Grace Morovich, and Cameron Rhodes, who recently performed in the school’s annual Broadway revue, were invited to the Board of Education meeting on Dec. 7 for a special performance of the song “Kids” from the hit 1960 Broadway musical “Bye Bye Birdie.”

“One of the great things about the Broadway revue, which is a tradition at Southside Middle School that happened exactly one month ago, is that it gives our students the opportunity to shine in a more particular way than when we do the spring musical,” Rockville Centre schools’ Arts Director Brian Zuar said. “Typically there are lead roles and everybody else as the chorus, but in the Broadway revue our directors, Mrs. Monsour and Ms. Elias, actually construct a show that features individual solos, duets, trios, quartets, small groups of singers, and the whole group so that they shine as individuals.”

Zuar said that unlike an ordinary stage production, the Broadway revue provides students with the opportunity to put on a show of their own creation and write the script.

Middle School students came up with the premise that a bunch of families are traveling on a cruise ship and their kids are driving parents crazy because they will not get off their phones.

“By the way, in about 30 years, you will appreciate this song even more when you have kids,” Zuar said to the students. “And honestly, all you parents out there, how many times have you said something and said ‘oh my god I’m turning into my mother or father?’ Well, this is that moment in the show.”