West Side Story

Cast party with Tommy

            West Side Story was INCREDIBLE! The cast put on such a hit, a total of five nights. There were four scheduled performances on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Jim Kraemer, an American who owns the construction company in the Marshall Islands, RRE Compound, the US Embassy, and Enimonet (just to name a few of his properties), paid Professor Garrod $1,000 to put on a private performance on Monday for his employees. We also found out that someone offered Garrod $5,000 to do the show another night, but he had to decline because the kids are in finals week and we wouldn’t have enough time to take apart the set and clean up the ICC. Wednesday and Thursday nights, there were about 250 people there, and then Friday and Saturday, we had between 800 and 900 audience members! Monday Kraemer brought about 600 people. It was the largest audience Professor Garrod has had for any of his plays in the 13 years he’s been coming to Majuro. We calculated that 1 out of every 10 people in Majuro saw the play, including the current president, former president, US ambassador, and minister of education.

Jets on Stage at the ICC

Bernardo (Vahid) and Tony (John)

            The show got raving reviews. Lulani, a senior from Co Op, the private school, played Maria, and she was amazing. She’s acted in a few films about the Marshall Islands and hopes to continue her education in America. John, a student at CMI, the community college of the Marshall Islands, played Tony. He’s been a lead in a few of Professor Garrod’s Shakespeare plays. The person who really stole the show, though, was Anita, who was played by Jennifer, a senior at Marshall Islands High School. She’s incredibly sassy and delivers all of her lines with so much gusto. She’s actually hilarious. Every time she opened her mouth, either to sing or speak, everyone laughed hysterically. The rest of the cast was extremely cohesive, and I’m amazed at the amount of hard work they put into the show. Professor Garrod had them staying for six hour practices, until 10 at night, and none of them ever complained. They just wanted to make the show perfect, and I think it was as close to perfect as could ever be.

Maria (Lulani) and Riff (Niten)

Henry and his ukulele

            My role for the show was makeup artist and operating the fog machines during two scenes. Every night before the play started, I did all of the cast members’ makeup, which was a lot of fun. I got to know the kids well, and it was especially funny to do the boys’ makeup. By the last night, all the boys were putting their own makeup on before I even got there. They were totally into it. I had a helper from MIHS, Mia, who also put makeup on the cast. She came when we were painting the sets too. She’s great. I’m definitely going to miss her.

Hanging out with the cast

Some impromptu acapella

            On Sunday, there was a cast party at Marshall Islands’ Resort. We were all jumping into the lagoon and everyone was getting thrown into the gross pool. It was so much fun hanging out with the cast and dancing and celebrating all of their efforts. They were doing impromptu acapella with their ukuleles, which was actually insane. I have a bunch of videos of their songs. At the end of the party, they did a skit where they imitated all of the volunteers, which was hilarious. They also sang us two goodbye songs, and we all almost cried. I’m going to miss these kids so much. They’re really great and talented, and I hope they continue with acting, singing, and dancing. It’s going to be hard to say goodbye at the end of the week!   

Jumping in the pool

Post pool jumping at cast party

The skit at the cast party