YaYa in "Mary Poppins"

This spring YaYa signed up for a role in her school's performance of Mary Poppins. You might remember me mentioning the twice a week after-school practices that demanded a lot of schedule wrangling.

I'm pretty blunt about school/kid functions. If it sucks, I'll say so - not to the kids of course, and I'll view it in the context of the ages involved - but you won't find me saying a music recital is as good as a day at Carnegie Hall.

Well, in the end the practices were worth it. Mary Poppins was unexpectedly good. Many of the main characters (all female; no males played starring roles) had strong voices, there was a decent attempt at scenery and costuming (the latter due to parent contributions) and the acting was decent for their age. Well done.

YaYa had a small speaking role as a bank customer. Lisa purchased her outfit from a convent thrift shop that caters to an older clientle, and my mother-in-law sewed the alterations.





Her line kicked off the run on the bank. "There's something wrong! The bank won't give someone their money!". She also vigorously pounded on a teller window, an act she kept hidden from us as a surprise for the show.





Our one complaint about the show was the length. It followed the musical line by line and stretched past the two hour mark. The trip to see the Uncle and other superfluous scenes should have been trimmed. As it was, however, Smiley did an admirable job staying serene for the show. LuLu had already saw the show at a 'school kids only ' performance and had no desire to sit through another.











Well done superstars!