Or I can start a scream across the whole damn South, and never shut my mouth until they understand!

I'd like to take a moment to talk about my high school.

I am a proud graduate of Appomattox Regional Governor's School for the Arts and Technology in Petersburg, VA. I'm a Musical Theater Major from the class of 2007.

Hold up.

Wait a minute.

Major? In high school?

Yes.

Appomattox Regional Governor's School (hencefoth abbreviated as "ARGS") is a magnet school drawing from 14 different school district across central Virginia. It's a full-time school, so students take both general academic courses (English, Mathematics, Science, History, Languages), and specialized courses in various arts or technology-based disciplines. Each student is of a certain "focus area" or "major"... I believe the current existing focus areas are: vocal music, instrumental music, theater arts, dance, visual arts, literary arts, and technology. (When I was at ARGS, "theater arts" was split into "Theater" and "Musical Theater"... I believe they are one major, now.) Within each focus area, you can specify further, and you are also able to take classes in other focus areas as well. In fact, any "arts"-related major is required to take a "technology"-focused class, and any "technology"-related major is required to take an "arts"-focused class. Admission to ARGS is through an application and adjudication process. You must be in good academic standing, and you also must go through an audition or portfolio review. It's actually rather similar to applying to college.

ARGS is part of the "gifted education system" of Virginia, which I have a few words about.

When I was in second grade, I had just moved to Virginia from southern Maryland (just outside of DC), where the public school system was, frankly, better. I'd been doing things far more advanced in 1st grade. And thus, I was in 2nd grade in Virginia, and I was failing math. Yeah. Makes no sense to me either. Apparently they decided I was bored, and put me in Advanced Math, and suddenly I was fine. How they figured that out, I have no idea. So I toddled along in Advanced Math for a while, and eventually they took me and several of my Advanced Math friends out of class and had us take what I remember to be this really, really easy test. Apparently what this test was was an "aptitude" test, to see whether we'd do well in "gifted education". My results showed that I would, so I was offered a place in Manchester Middle School's "Center Based Gifted" (CBG) program. And after attending open houses, I decided to go to Manchester. Largely because they took more field trips.

Here is what I'll say about CBG.

I had phenomenal teachers. Really, I did. I had phenomenal teachers and phenomenal peers. And I had a great time in class, learning a lot more than I suspect I would have in a "normal" program. And great teachers. I mean it. Truly great. (I have been blessed to have had an unusual number of incredible teachers throughout my life.)

However... here was my problem with the whole system:

The system seemed to say, "Let's gather up all the gifted students with high test scores, and shove them into an already overcrowded public middle school that's not doing particularly well so they will raise the school's test scores." There was a huge socio-economic divide between the "gifted" kids and the "non-gifted" kids and the tensions ran HIGH. The school did not encourage integration--quite the opposite. The only class I had with non-CBG kids was Orchestra. We had a separate lunch period. The hallway tension between the two groups was unmistakable, though, and the insults hurled were potent. And the overcrowding was awful. I distinctly remember one class change where a teacher had to stop everyone in the hallway because students were being trampled.

Again, the education I got was phenomenal. The environment it happened in, I hated. Absolutely hated. Add to that that it was middle school, and middle school is a horrible time in an adolescent's life. I adopted an extremely negative world view in middle school. Seethingly negative. For a lot of reasons. I was easily the most pessimistic, cynical person I knew. I was good at playing the little ray of sunshine when I had to (at church), but it was not a happy place, and not the least of my pessimistic theories of the world was that, to the education system at large, I only mattered for my score on the standardized test. (Which, looking back on it... is probably true. Of course, there were people within that system, namely those magnificent teachers, who cared about me far more than I would let my bitter, jaded self believe or accept.)

The straw that broke the camel's back was, though, the extreme importance placed on schoolwork. Which, duh, it's an education system, of course, but with the added burden of "being gifted", it grew to outrageous proportions. One night, I was sobbing because I couldn't think of a topic for my science fair project (science has never, ever been my forte). And that night, I thought there was something distinctly wrong feeling like a failure as a person because of a science fair, which, I suspected, was not THAT important in the grand scheme of things. And that was the night I decided, "I want out." I did not want to participate in this system of "gifted education" anymore, because it was turning me into a grade-obsessed creature. I suspected there was more to life than that. So thank you, but goodbye.

When I entered eigth grade, the focus became on, "Apply to high school!" which translated to, "You're thirteen! Decide what you're going to do with your life!" Awful. Terrible. My county, Chesterfield County, had contracted the herpes of gifted education. "Specialty centers", much like the CBG program, had sprung up in EVERY SINGLE HIGH SCHOOL IN THE COUNTY. I'm not kidding. Two of them had IB programs. Monacan had the "center for the Humanities". There was the Clover Hill Math/Science program that inevitably over half of the CBG graduating class went to every year (all my friends ended up there - I knew there was no way in HELL for me). There was a "leadership" program, whatever that meant, there was even "Spanish immersion". The idea of going to your home high school, as a "normal high school student" was shocking. Most people in CBG applied to at least five high schools. The idea of going into another program in this kind of environment was sickening to me. Educators harped on the "school within a school" thing as getting the "best of both worlds". Maybe in some Uptopian school, but that was NEVER my experience. I would have loved the CBG program if it was in its own school. Its own building. There was one program, Monacan's Humanities program, that sounded vaguely interesting to me, and I applied more because of peer pressure than anything.

Then there were the Governor's Schools.

I was skeptical, because I was skeptical about gifted education in general, but I went to the open houses of both of the Governor's Schools I was eligible for. Those were Maggie Walker for Government and International Studies, and ARGS. Both of these schools, unlike the "school within a school" system, were entirely composed of students who had applied and been accepted. Maggie Walker, I knew, it was well-established as a school. ARGS, I had heard distant rumors about. It was brand-new (it was actually three years old when I was in eighth grade). I'd heard crazy stories about the arts kids like... never going to class, or something. (I remember asking one of my Math teachers about that when specialty high schools were mentioned in class. He said that wasn't true, that they did go to class, but a lot of class was focused around individual artistic projects. What I didn't know then, but know now, was that his son was the then star of the ARGS Musical Theater department. Graduated the year before I came to ARGS.)

I went to Maggie Walker's open house, but I wasn't particularly interested, much to the chagrin of my mother. It seemed great, but it was the kind of place I'd sob over a paper again, I felt, and I didn't want that. So I didn't apply. Again, much to the chagrin of my mother, who felt it would be a great place for me, as I'd participated in the Model UN there before (I represented India on Disarmament and International Security) and had a strong interest in being a lawyer.

But I'd gotten the information sheet on ARGS... and I was intrigued. More intrigued than I tried to admit to people. And I wanted to apply to ARGS for musical theater.

This was actually really funny.

Because while I had grown up listening to Rodgers and Hammerstein and Andrew Lloyd Webber (I knew every word of Joseph, even all the colors of his coat), and had always shown an interest in musical theater, I had never done any musical theater. Ever. I'd actually never done any theater. I scoffed at my middle school's drama department which did things like, "Who Wants To Win a 20 Dollar Bill, hosted by Geek Dorkman!" and refused to get involved on principle. (MMS developed a real drama department after I left. Of course.) I'd never taken classes because I was in Orchestra. Unless you count the musical theater summer thing I did after 4th grade, where we did an American Girl play and selections from Cats (I played Mungojerry and my "choreography" was running around on stage making a mess... but it WAS the first of many, many times I was cast male), or the Moods'n'Tunes musicals at church, where I sang "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree" with my father, I'd never been in a show. And it's true. I didn't know what a rehearsal process was by any stretch of the imagination. ARGS was the place for the kids who did shows in Richmond theater. I didn't even know Richmond theater existed. In fact, I am pretty sure I showed no serious aptitude or interest in going into theater as a career until I started looking at going to ARGS for high school. The only thing I could trace it to was Halloween 2001, when I saw Sweeney Todd, which was the start of the most overtaking obsession I have experienced in my life thus far. I saw Sweeney Todd, and I became incredibly, incredibly curious about musical theater.

So, I would apply to ARGS for musical theater.

My parents were very confused, and I seem to remember them telling me I wouldn't get in if I applied for musical theater. I could apply for vocal music, or literary arts and probably get in. Or even violin. Or even technology! But musical theater? Really?!

Yup. I wanted to apply for musical theater.

And I am very, very stubborn.

I went to the open house. I remember very little about it except wandering into the "black box" (which I thought was the coolest thing in the WORLD having worn all black since Februrary of 6th grade--I had no idea that a "black box" is a very common concept in theater nowadays) where the theater and musical theater majors were leading improv games. It was "Freeze", as I recall. And I watched, and laughed, and this girl, who I believe was Emma, came up to me and said, "Are you applying to ARGS?" I nodded. "What's your focus area?" "Musical theater," I answered. Probably extremely quietly, as I had no conception of making noise above a certain decibel level in those days. Speaking wasn't my thing. "Oh, you'll be PERFECT!" she said, and suddenly she dragged me onto the stage.

...

...

...

I had no idea what was going on. I'd figured out the rules of the game, yes, but I was on stage and had no idea what to do with that. Cue: terror.

I ended up improv-ing with another eighth grader who had been randomly pulled onto the stage, an extremely tall boy who I'd seen at the Maggie Walker Open House (familiar face! Yes! Comfort!) And it was less improv, and more of us talking about Metallica on stage for a very short amount of time because it got very painful very early on and someone called, "Freeze!"

I was shaky and scared, but TOTALLY applying to this school.

Application? No problem. Essay? Pfft.

Audition?

Another story.

Based on my audition, I have no idea how I got into ARGS. The biggest part of it was the singing audition. I sang "Think of Me" from Phantom of the Opera because I could only sing classically. And I really mean ONLY. I thought "belting" was a bad word. My freshman year at ARGS, my musical theater teacher had me sing "I Hate Men" and I sang it like opera. I had incredible technique, especially for my age... but technique that enabled me to blend in a choir extremely well. Not solo technique. I also had no volume. None. At all. I am surprised they heard me. Not kidding. They had me sing "happy birthday" to try to get me a little louder, but I couldn't. This was actually a constant struggle for me throughout high school. My junior year, one of my classmates said to me, "Colleen! I HEARD you!" Last year, my voice and speech teacher told me I could tone it down on the volume because I was becoming more resonant which was making it louder automatically - and that was HUGE. This Christmas Eve at 7pm, my mic was muted and no one was at the sound board when I read the Christmas scripture, and I thought, "They have to HEAR this. THEATER SCHOOL, GO!" and some people thought my mic was on. Yessss.

So for a major part of the audition, they just couldn't hear me. Whatsoever. I was being drowned out by the piano. Which is a crappy piano and it's really hard to get sound from it.

The dance section? No idea. I'd never done choreographed dance before beyond the occasional choral step-touch. I smiled a lot. I think. "Theater games" (improv, which I still hate), equally painful. I was saved because I did a "neutral scene" (where they give you lines that really don't say anything and you have to fill them in) where they were talking about "Do you have the time?" "No." and I happened to be wearing not one, but two watches, so it gave me something to do. (I did that scene with, in fact, the same extraordinarily tall boy I improv-ed with at the open house.)

And that was that.

There was nothing left to do but wait. My parents thinking I wouldn't get in, me hoping I would.

And then I was waitlisted.

...so no one really won that battle for a while.

Adam, the tall guy, and I singing "The Song That Goes Like This" from Spamalot, junior year.

Then one day shortly thereafter, I got a call, saying, "We wanted to wait and send you a letter, because this is the kind of thing that you should get to open the letter for, but... you've been accepted into ARGS, and there are some people who are coming and shadowing on Friday, so you can come shadow on Friday as well, if you like!"

"Shadowing" means following a student from your program around for a day to see what an average day is like. It also means you get to not go to your school for a day. Clearly, "shadowing" is one of the most awesome concepts in the world, and that Friday, I caught a bus to ARGS.

I was immediately pounced upon, by both Hilary and Brittney. "ARE YOU A SHADOW?!" "...yes?" "WHAT'S YOUR MAJOR?!" "...musical theater." Being musical theater and theater majors, they immediately started fighting over me. They took me to the office, made sure I knew where to go, and I ended up shadowing Hilary for most of the day. Since it wasn't a regular "shadow day" I was particularly fawned over. I was quiet, and spent most of the time writing. "What're you writing?" "A novel." "Oh, cool. I wasn't sure if you meant like... stories or music." "I write music too." "YOU'RE THE NEXT MATT!!" "This is my shadow, her name's Colleen, she's a musical theater and she writes novels and music." (I was never called "the next Matt" again. When I actually got to the school I was "the next Sam", forever, which is now really hilarious.)

The thing that got me, that day, was the joy.

I had never seen so many people so enthusiastic about their school. They were so happy, so interested, so at home. And they wanted me there. People asked me throughout the day, "ARE YOU GOING TO COME?!" and at the beginning of the day, I wasn't sure. By the end, I was saying, "Yes." Had I talked with my parents about it yet? Nope. But I was going ahead and saying "yes." Because of the joy, because of the feeling of immense pride these students had in their school, which was something I'd never witnessed before.

I was in eighth grade. I didn't know what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. It's silly to think that I would. I didn't look at ARGS like I looked at college, looking for the opportunities I'd have to create work and whatnot. I came to ARGS because I felt a different kind of education was happening there than the one that made me cry over a grade.

And, truth, it seemed more fun.

When I came to ARGS, I actually knew very, very little about musical theater. I had Rodgers and Hammerstein. I had Andrew Lloyd Webber. And I had my Sweeney Todd. That was pretty much it. My family got into Ragtime, had seen a production at Dogwood Dell the summer before. Sweeney and Ragtime were probably the most "obscure" musicals I knew at the time, and they're not obscure at all (not compared to "Bark!" or "The Last Starfighter: the Musical" or "Weird Romance"). My first day as a student at ARGS was actually show choir camp before my freshman year started (it was the year of Hairspray, and the Branson trip). I arrive at ARGS with Becky (our parents knew each other and thus did that awkward "arranged friendship" thing. Becky's great, I love her, but the first few weeks were strange), and were immediately greeted by Sam, wearing bright yellow jazz pants, who directed us to Regan and Emily after complimenting my shoes. It was a day of all of the freshmen sticking together in a scared, silent clump as the older kids did their thing and ran around this confusing building and danced, which I sure couldn't do. But one conversation I had that day, I still remember clear as a bell:

I saw Sam handing a book of Ragtime vocal selections to a girl, Kris. Little did I know that both of them had been in the production I'd seen a few months before.

Me: That's a good musical.
Sam, after the slight pause that I'm pretty sure was surprise that I actually spoke: It's the best musical.
Me: No. Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street is the best musical.
Sam: I LOVE YOU, LET'S TALK. Did you see the concert version with Patti LuPone?

...the significance of this question is something very difficult to impress upon minds other than mine. That concert version had happened almost two years before. I had been completely and totally obsessed with it. And obsessed with Sweeney Todd only through it and the Original Broadway Cast Recording, because this was before the 1982 version had been released on DVD (which didn't happen until April 20th, 2004). The 1982 version, which includes much of the original Broadway cast, is a film of the tour, and was an INCREDIBLY rare VHS. My brother had seen it because his drama teacher had gotten the last copy sold used on Amazon. I had tried to locate it, but any copy I could find was well over $100, which is a fortune for a middle schooler. Thus, my entire Sweeney Todd obsession, up to that point, was only visually facilitated by the pictures I could scrounge up... and the concert version. Now, most people I spoke to did not know Sweeney Todd. A few teachers of mine knew it, though my Orchestra teacher refused to speak of it because it freaked him out so much. And no one, NO ONE I met knew the concert version. I would try to talk about the concert version with people, but NO ONE KNEW IT. I could not discuss the incredible look Patti LuPone gave that absolutely summed up her entire character's journey at the end. I could not go on about the giant choir and how terrifying it was, not with anyone who could aptly respond. And now, here I was in a giant, terrifying new school, with this strange guy who was wearing yellow pants and liked Converse, AND HE KNEW THE CONCERT VERSION?! HE, IN FACT, BROUGHT IT UP BEFORE /I/ DID?!

I was home.

And indeed, ARGS was my home for four years. As a Musical Theater major, I was always at school. Literary arts majors could go home and work there... but since our work was collaborative, we were at school. All the time. School from 8:30 - 3:30 (or 3:40? It changed during my time there), then rehearsals from 4-7. Then tech week, where we didn't go home. (Truth: my grandparents lived just outside of Petersburg at the time... I lived at their place during Annie's tech week, to save me the 45 minute drives back and forth. 1.5 hours including carpool drop offs.) I was there all the time and I loved every minute of it. Summers were the worst. I was chomping at the bit to go back to school. Any opportunity I had. We'd get emails saying, "We're going to clean the Black Box and need some help," I was THERE. I was annoying about how much I wanted to go back to school. There are journal entries of, "I haven't been to ARGS for 64 days. I don't know what's going on." I loved, loved, loved that school.

In my time at ARGS, I not only took full high school loads of English, History, Science, Math (though I had two years of high school math under my belt before I came to ARGS, so I only took two years of math while there), and German, but I took:

Foundations of Theater (remains one of the most useful classes I've ever taken)
Acting I, III, and IV (I skipped II, somehow)
Musical Theater Techniques I and II (classes which no longer exist, hehe)
Four years of Show Choir
Screen and Film I and II
Directing/Playwrighting I and II (only time II has ever been offered)
Modern Dance
Musical Theater Applied Voice for Seniors
Recording Technology (which I was convinced I'd never use again. Now I do sound design. Never say never.)

Fact: you don't get these classes at any other school. Acting, maybe. There's the "all-encompassing" high school "Drama" class, I guess. Show choir, yeah. But to get this in depth, in high school? It's unheard of.

I knew nothing about theater when I entered ARGS, basically speaking. By the end of my freshman year I had a mini-encyclopedia knowledge of musical theater. People started calling me the next Sam, which was huge because Sam was the star and Sam was going to the NYU CAP21 summer program (and came back talking about "actions" and we were like, "...what?") and Sam knew more about musical theater than anyone else in the world and Sam disappeared to New York practically every weekend. (I recently was talking with Sam about A Little Night Music. There's a revival on Broadway now that he's seen, and he asked me if I knew the piece. Of course I knew the piece. I owned the script of it in high school. He said, "I didn't know it, really." And thus I found out there was a Sondheim musical Sam didn't know in high school. OH THE SHATTERED ILLUSIONS!) I didn't learn all I learned about musical theater by sitting and memorizing the nominations and winners of the Tony Awards. I absorbed it, by being in this environment that was so excited about it. Because what that environment did to me was it awoke a passion in me I didn't know I had. My musical theater teacher for the first two years, Mrs. Ingram, was vital to that. As was the head of the theater department and Sage of Theater, Dr. Fenn. I was running around excitedly, leaping, and jumping and they told me, "You know, you've got something here."

Because not everyone from ARGS pursues their focus area for the rest of their lives. Because it's silly to think you know what you want to do in eighth grade. A surprising few of us from my musical theater graduating class are actually pursuing theater. Which is great. I am convinced of the value of an arts-based education. The lessons we learned doing shows together are the same lessons people need working on a corporate team together. My cousin is going into nursing and was talking about how you want to be assigned to a unit that's like a team, and I thought about the essentials of collaboration and how well-prepared someone who has a background in the arts would be to enter that kind of environment. And when you study theater, you're studying the world. Dr. Fenn said that all the time, and it's true. My freshman year we did A Raisin in the Sun - you know how much we learned about people, and history, and social injustice from doing that play? It's HUGE.

And for those of us who have ended up pursuing our majors further, ARGS was a phenomenal jumping off point. I honestly had no idea I cared so much about my work until Dr. Fenn, who did not know me well at the time, pointed it out. I had no idea not everyone had so much fun on set construction crew or was so happy in rehearsal. ("It is characteristic of the power and vehemence of love that all things seem possible to it, and it believes all men to be of the same mind as itself." - Dark Night of the Soul) And I was chatting with Mrs. Ingram about Sweeney, of course, and she threw into my head the idea of directing it, right around the time my sophomore year when I started to be dissatisfied with acting. Then Becker came in and we'd talk and he'd say, "You really need to read The Empty Space." And then I did and I said, "He talked about this guy Artaud a lot... do you have anything by him?" and he handed me The Theater and Its Double and said, "Be careful with him, he's crazy." And then Morrie Piersol came in and Dr. Fenn said, "Colleen, would you like to stage manage?" and Piersol, particularly being from the professional theater world, ended up showing me the ropes of running a production.

ARGS was the place it began. The Empty Space was required reading before I entered PHTS--I'd just finished reading it when I got the list. I have now read The Theater and Its Double five times for various classes and papers. There are so many things, ideas, concepts that were tossed to me at ARGS, sometimes in depth, sometimes in passing, that are absolute STAPLES of my training in New York. Most of it is far beyond "high school level". The fact that I had not only heard of, but DONE some Fitzmaurice voice work before college was mindblowing. We did one day of it. They only do a week of it in first year to introduce it because it's the base of the second year voice and speech curriculum, but it's still a bit to sophisticated for first years. HIGH SCHOOL?! Seriously, no one does Fitzmaurice work in high school. The entire unit we did of Grotowski work helped me plunge into Viewpoints much quicker than I would have otherwise. Second year acting at PHTS, filled with exercises we did in Acting III. I did clowning in high school. Laban effort actions - I walked into first year voice and speech at PHTS one day to see them written on the board and started laughing hysterically. The entire concept of composition. These are things you just don't get in normal high school. When we learned IPA, it was me and the kid from LaGuardia (Fame school!) who already knew it. When I've mentioned, "Oh, we talked about this in high school," people have asked, "What high school did you go to?!" and no one would guess it was this small, budding 350 student arts and technology-based high school in Petersburg, Virginia.

The opportunities there are growing rapidly. The school was only seven when I graduated, so there were sometimes things that we wanted to see happen that just couldn't yet, but I'd like to believe paved the way for other things to happen. (Like my senior directing project. Sigh. It would've been awesome. We tried really hard.) I'm jealous of some of the opportunities there now. But I loved being a part of the school and program's development. I love that I took classes that no longer exist. I love that I'm in the school's rule book. (The director of the school instated what he called the "Carter and Colleen Rule" allowing non-distracting bandanas and hats to be worn when it's not class time. It's not listed as "The Carter and Colleen Rule", but that's what he calls it. The bowler hat did its work.)

And what of the bitter, cynical, depressed pessimist who left middle school? It has been a slow process. A very slow process, because it's environment and background and mental processes and medical things. But starting with ARGS, and continuing through PHTS and Montreat, I have become the most honestly optimistic person I know. It had a vital, VITAL beginning at ARGS, the beginning of a huge healing process, because before ARGS, there was never anything I truly loved.

Tonight, I went back to ARGS to see their production of Working: the Musical. This is one of those opportunities that I am jealous of - the senior theater arts class put this together themselves, as part of a class. Staged it, designed it, performed it, publicized it. And it was thrilling. Truly thrilling. Some things didn't work, surely, but that's the point. That's how you learn, and this production was very bold and I know they have learned, and will continue to learn, a lot from it. It is a joy for me to see that school continue to grow. I walked in tonight and they had floor mics. FLOOR MICS! I flipped.

Why am I gushing all of this out now?

Chesterfield County is cutting expenses, and in looking at how to do so, is considering stopping sending students to both ARGS and Maggie Walker.

Chesterfield County sends the most students to each school. ARGS has 356 students this year, and 129 of them are from Chesterfield.

If Chesterfield County "eliminates participation" in the Governor's Schools, they both face, at best, severe budget cuts, staff cuts, and program elimination. At worst, they face closure.

Here is the Richmond Times-Dispatch article.

I have often thought it was a miracle I got into ARGS in the first place. Chesterfield County buys the most "slots" per year as far as sending people goes. I was waitlisted from Chesterfield County. Had I lived in any other district, I would not have gotten into ARGS.

I am upset, and gushing, and saying everything I think right now. It's not articulate yet. It will be. I will take words and hone them and sharpen them and weave them and use them, because I don't know of anything else worth fighting for so fiercely. Because, for me, and for others I know, ARGS was more than a school. Sam, that intense musical theater guy, came into ARGS as a saxophone major and wandered into a Godspell rehearsal and said, "I want to do that." I was drawn to ARGS, and I didn't just an education. A whole world opened up to me, a world that was fascinating and beautiful and still intrigues me every day of my life. A world I fell in love with and chose to pursue. A world with life and vitality. I came in hating everything, including myself. I discovered love at ARGS. And instead of being the depressed kid wearing all black sitting in the corner writing something cynical, I became the dorky one wearing all black leaping onto stages (occasionally banging my knee really badly) and running around with a five pound binder muttering about "if we stage 'Pirelli's' as a semiotic battle for the crowd... where they're physically moving between Pirelli and Todd... with the Beadle in the center... the Beadle is no longer relegated to 'oh we happen to be using the Beadle how quaint' but make him another active participant, and if the crowd is all over at Todd's side... then Pirelli works desperately to regain with the oft-cut toothpulling sequence, that can make the toothpulling actually VITAL.. especially if we really in the Beadle's favor with all of this... because Pirelli does NEED the Beadle's favor...", pulling out rehearsal blocks and (yes) chairs to represent people and set up scenes and block, block, block, all the time. Babbling incoherently to those around me.

Taking a break while blocking "Epiphany". With a chair. Of course.

People sometimes ask the question, "Did ARGS help you get into NYU?"

This is a really silly question.

I could tell you that I presented that five pound binder to the head of the drama department at NYU at that time and said, "This is what I do in my free time." I could tell you that I had to have a monologue prepared, and I spent hours in that Black Box with Becker coaching me on that monologue, him taking time out of his busy schedule, often his entire lunch break, because he insisted on seeing it every day a week leading up to my audition. I could tell you that the quality of essays required at ARGS made my admissions essay significantly stronger.

But really, if there were not ARGS, I would not be at NYU. Period. If there were not ARGS, I probably would not have even applied to NYU. If there were not ARGS, I would probably be a lawyer. And I think I'd make a decent lawyer, but I think I make a much better theater artist. If there were not ARGS, most of you reading this would not know me. If there were not ARGS, I wouldn't care half as much.

But there was ARGS. And I got into NYU. And thanks to the combined powers of both of them, because ARGS has helped me grab onto PHTS with vigor, I think I will actually be able to make my living in the theater, which are words not easily said. I could brag, about my current teachers, list credentials and awards and nominations and recordings and people they've worked with or talk about how I knew some of their names even in high school (I was actually the biggest fan of one of the first year acting teachers. I owned every recording she was on and wanted to steal her vocal chords. Now I know her and I cannot bring myself to steal her vocal chords, she's just too nice). And when I write the actual, articulate letter I might throw some of that in to try to get across the caliber of people I am privileged to encounter every day. And one of the things that continually blows my mind is the belief many of them have in me and my work. And none of that, NONE OF THAT would be there if it weren't for ARGS.

It's not "it made a difference in my life." It made my life what it is. Not by handing it to me prepackaged to reheat, but by putting me in an incredible, stimulating environment with people who cared, deeply. That is the kind of education we need in this world.

(and for the record, I love my life.)

One day my sophomore year, I came into my Pre-Calculus class and my teacher was listening to a musical. I listened for a while, trying to figure out what it was, and was soon joined by Elliott, a junior musical theater major. He was also unable to identify it. Our teacher told us it was Kiss of the Spider Woman. Before every class from then on, he'd play a musical for us to guess. Once, he was playing Kiss of the Spider Woman again. We still didn't get it. When he told us what it was, we said, "No fair, you did that one before!" He said, "Yeah. And you still don't know it." This past semester in college, I co-directed Kiss of the Spider Woman.

For my 18th birthday, my friend Carolyn made me a to-scale model of the ARGS stage. Because I needed to stare at a stage to block things. (And blocking things was my favorite past-time.) So I thought I could only block at ARGS so she brought ARGS to me. It's in my room here right now, and I keep glancing at it. Seeing that stage tonight, being in that building, reminded me of the love I have for it. How many hours I poured into it. My blood is on the wood storage wracks in the stagecraft room. That stage, which you'll see if you look at the third picture on that RTD article, is my native stage. Two weeks into my freshman year, Jerry Herman (composer/lyricist for Mame, Hello Dolly, Mack and Mabel, Milk and Honey, Dear World... to name a few), Don Pippin (who musical directed everything Paul Gemignani didn't), Susan Egan (original Belle in Broadway's Beauty and the Beast, voice of Meg in Disney's movie Hercules), Karen Morrow (original cast of I Had a Ball), and Jason Graae (original Sparky in Forever Plaid, original Mendel in Falsettos) came to do master classes and performances at ARGS. I, scared meek little freshman, was asked by Mrs. Ingram, who knew I could read music, if I would be interested in page turning for Don Pippin. (What she did not know is that I happen to be a professional, extremely skilled page turner. I am not joking. It's an art.) I spent the afternoon in dress rehearsal with these Broadway names, had a delightful conversation with Jerry Herman about the name "Colleen", and that evening was standing in the stage right wing with Don Pippin, waiting to follow him on stage. And I remember thinking, "This is where it begins."

Yup. For me and for so many. Chatting with people after the show tonight, I was reminded of how great of an effect ARGS has had on so many people. The seniors performing tonight were freshmen when I graduated, and watching how much they've grown was incredible. I had a conversation with Kelsey, who designed lights for Working, who's gotten into NCARTS for lighting, about the lights in the show and design in general, and it was delightful, especially as design isn't a huge thing for students at ARGS yet. Though, for students who are interested, like Kelsey, the opportunities are there. (If she goes the technician route, I'll throttle her. The girl has IDEAS. Lots of them. Design, design, design.)

ARGS' building, for the record, is the old Petersburg High School building. It's renovated, but as the same outward appearance. My grandfather graduated from the old Petersburg High School, and his class was given a print of a sketch of it when they graduated. When he passed away, that print was given to me. I have that, and I have the model of the stage, and I cannot stand the idea of those being emblems of a school that no longer exists.

And by the way, Carolyn, who made me that model? She's now a first year at PHTS.

Oh, and crazy musical theater Sam? He went to NYU, starting at CAP21, then transferred to PHTS the same year I started there. He's still doing musical theater (just finished a run of Forum), but now also does strange postmodern dance theater pieces. (It was strange that people called me "the next Sam" because he was so TAP SHOES and I was so BLOCKING. Then we both ended up at PHTS.) He's working. He's making a living.

Oh, and Kris, the girl he was in Ragtime with? Also went to NYU.

Oh, and Emma, the girl who dragged me on stage to improv at the open house? I was chatting about her with the artistic director of an off-Broadway theater company of growing prominence. Then he put me on a student board of theirs.

It might seem like a small incidental school in Virginia, but it has changed (dare I say saved?) lives.

There is a Governing Board meeting on Thursday, the 14th, that's open to interested parties, where the director of ARGS is presenting the additional budget cuts (after several rounds of previous cuts) that the Governing Board has asked for. That's the day of my train back to New York, so I cannot go, but one of the teachers is collecting letters from students and alumni. And I'll be damned if I don't write the best bloody letter I will ever write. And do whatever else I can do. Campaign in the streets? I'll go full-out Les Mis on this if I have to. It matters.

Hugging the stage during Cinderella strike, senior year.

"Look at all the things you've done for me.
Opened up my eyes
Taught me how to see
Notice every tree
Understand the light
Concentrate on now...

Look at all the things you gave to me.
Let me give to you something in return.
I would be so pleased."

There is still more to see.