Beauty and the Beast Jr. at Dixie Elementary - Tonight Only!
The Production
Beauty and the Beast Jr.
Presented by the fifth grade students of Dixie Magnet Elementary School
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The Beauty Of It All!
I always have a wonderful time at Dixie Elementary. Music Teacher/Director Crystal Peters does a lovely job with her students, training them to sing in tune and to speak loudly and clearly, with lots of expression. This is no small feet when you are directing fifty 5th graders on a stage in the school's cafeteria.
The show starts off strong with clear and expressive narrators (Brandon Dansby, Cash Doolin, McKenna Jones, Gustavor Ortiz-Steicher, Zared Taylor) filling us in on the cursed Prince's history, while Sean Rogers as the Prince and Ariana McPherson as the Enchantress provide polished pantomime acting to create visual interest. Kara Peters as Belle then takes the stage, promptly joined by the villagers, who all work together to deliver a musically strong rendition of "Belle". Notable moments in this show include Maurice's entrance (Braden Carpenter), the song "Gaston" lead by power belter Kennon Pavona as Lefou, and beautiful singing from Kara Peters and the rest of the leads.
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Creative Movement
I greatly enjoyed the simple and polished take on "The Mob Song", which was cleverly blocked to easily move the many bodies on stage.
The idea to feature the Napkins as dancers was also a special treat.
With so many vocally talented children in this cast, Mrs. Peters makes good use of their strengths by expanding the roles of "Silly Girls" from 3 to 9, and by choosing to have small groups sing in most numbers that are usually solos or duets. This was a wise choice both to up the volume and the participation of the cast members.
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn
Set design is a complicated Beast. The more beautiful and elaborate it is, the less space it leaves for the actors on stage. In this production, four periaktos were used to transition between the Village, the Castle, and the Dining Room. The West Wing consists of a beautiful set piece that is painted as the stained glass window, with the enchanted rose in front of it on a table. The West Wing is the furthest upstage, allowing it to be mostly hidden in the Village scenes (more-so in the first village scene than the last one), but visible and lit for the Castle scenes. Although I found the placement of the West Wing to be visually appealing, I found that having it as a fixed set piece cut quite a bit of depth from the stage. If the West Wing had been placed at an extremity of Stage Right or Left, this would have left center stage open to create more depth opportunity for the large ensemble scenes. Perhaps one periaktoi could have been painted as the West Wing and been part of the Castle scene, allowing all four periaktos to be moved further upstage for the entirety of the show.
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See the Show
Dixie Magnet Elementary School
Tuesday, May 16th, 2017 at 6pm
Admission is Free!
