Thursday, July 23, 2015

Guys and Dolls at Antilles High School

Another find! I was scanning some of my mother's old slides, none of which we had ever seen, and found this shot of Leif (second from left), on stage in his first part in a Broadway musical . . . which we missed!

In April 1991, Peter was sent to a conference in the Washington DC area, and wanted me to go with him. My mother came to Puerto Rico to stay with Leif while we were gone and visit us when we returned.

Antilles High School was putting on "Guys and Dolls," and we knew that Leif was helping with scene construction and lightning, but didn't know he had a small part as well. I'm not sure he even found out he'd be on stage during the performance until we were gone. We were away when the musical was performed and missed seeing him. This photo seems to be the only one. He is wearing his Fedora and carrying his camera. I wish we had been there.

He seemed to be bitten by the theater bug by this experience, and the following spring tried out for a main part in "Grease." No one had ever heard him sing before, but he blew away the audience as Kenicke singing "Greased Lightning."

We moved to Manhattan, Kansas the summer before his senior year, and he tried out for the MHS musical, and was terribly disappointed when he was told that he was good enough to get a major part, but was new to the school and didn't "deserve" it. We never saw him on stage again.