by Julie Gowel ·
Friday, November 8, 2024
Hildreth Elementary School thespians, together with Superstar Productions, celebrated opening night of the fall musical, “Space Pirates!,” in the auditorium on Friday, Nov. 1, at 7 p.m. The hour-long show was set on a spaceship and featured aliens, humans, and pirates, played by students in grades 3 through 5 who sang, danced, and quipped to applause and laughter, delighting the audience in what appeared to be a sold-out performance.
The play was directed by Kelly Elwood, Michael Day, and Eliora Despres. Elwood took the helm of Superstar Productions in 2021 but the company has been producing musicals for HES for over 20 years.
The story opened with the entire cast walking through the audience and onto the steps in front of the stage while the curtain remained closed. A museum guide, played by Mia Janovitz, is talking to bored-looking students on a field trip about “old stuff,” when the entire ensemble bursts into song.
We are introduced to a character named Gabby, played by Caroline Kirk, a history buff ostracized for her love of bygone eras. She is sent with a group of students to find the museum restrooms when lights begin to flash, beep-boop sounds ring out, and the kids start spinning as the curtain opens to a stage set as a spaceship. Neil Elwood, set constructor, used silver tassels, a “window” painted with a cosmic vista, and faux control panels to transport actors and audience members into the starry expanse of outer space.
Aliens enter the scene, complete with sparkly green skirts and deely bobbers affixed with green fluff balls adorning their heads. The humans are frightened the aliens will “turn their guts to goo” but Gabby wants to give the extraterrestrials the benefit of the doubt. The aliens perform “Blarg a Riptoo,” a tribute song about human culture, while the accidental human stowaways marvel at their out-of-this-world robot dance moves. Hailing from planet Zooglebotz, the aliens croon about the absolute boredom of their origin in explanation of their fascination with Earth and its inhabitants.
Suddenly, the ship is taken over by pirates. The pirate captain, played by Isaac Latzman, leads his crew in a rousing rendition of the play’s title song, ”Space Pirates.” The captain is interested in a “large and heavy treasure” the buccaneers had detected aboard the ship while they are oddly obsessed with finding teacups.
One of the humans, a young boy named Jack, played by James Romero, sneaks away and stumbles upon the pirates. Jack’s admiration for pirate culture endears him to the space crew he wants to join. Jack impresses the space pirates with his ability to speak their language, with many “arrrgghs,” “ahoys,” and “yo-ho-hos,” as well as his expert execution of the floss dance.
The partnership is short-lived, however, as Jack is unwilling to steal from his new alien friends. The pirate captain tries to make Jack walk the zero-gravity plank, but Gabby saves him and the rest of the crew with her extensive knowledge of Greek history. Deploying a Trojan statue, a large and heavy treasure made up of the humans, the aliens take advantage of the pirates’ distraction, capturing them and imprisoning them with toy springs.
The story ends with the entire cast—minus the captain who was deported to the boring planet Zooglebotz after his crew declared mutiny—performing “Ancient Stuff Protectors.” Aliens, pirates, and humans come together to appreciate one another’s differences, rather than using them as an excuse to fear and persecute one another. An apt end to a story, as the saying goes: out of the mouths of babes, or in this case, out of ye mouths of swashbucklers!