Drama Mammas

I promised to tell the tale of interfering parents re drama clases, so...

I have one class on Tuesday at an elementary school. The kids have known each other a while in a school context, so they tend to mesh better as a class. This is good and bad. The good is that I don't have to coax them along to admit newcomers. The bad is that they all know each other and tend to be harder to settle down.

That's okay, though. I'm getting reports from the boss that they respond to me much better than their previous teacher who was not at all able to get them to behave. This is a good sign, and I hope I get them again next year. They're likable, funny, and usually teachable.

There are a pair of twin boys in that class, Adam and Tim. Tim is tow-headed, confident, outspoken and cute. Adam is more shy, freckledy, sandy-haired, and more hesitant. Tim makes a good lead in a play; Adam makes a good character for a smaller part. I cast them as such in the Western we're doing, and had Tim cast as the surprise hero. I had noticed something in him during parent day casting, so I had read this play with him in mind for the role.

The first class we read from the script, Tim had to be noticed by Rachel, who had to say a line to the effect that Tim was handsome. Both Tim and Rachel rebelled. Apparently, Rachel likes Tim, and didn't want that to be memorialized in the play.

Shoot me, I thought. Shoot me now. Then I told them all to grow up, but I said it nicely.

So my boss called me and said Tim is upset about the play. Tim and Adam's mother said that Tim is always the Golden One and Adam needs his chance to be in the spotlight. She wanted to pull both the boys out of the program, but would keep them in if I switched their roles. Plus, Mama was going to give Tim $75 to swap.

I did NOT want to do this. But since they pushed, I did. Subsequent rehearsals have shown that Adam does not remember lines well, no matter how I drill him. I sent the script via my boss to the mother, asking her to work on it with them. I'll know Tuesday whether she has or not. I'm trying not to be a stinking perfectionist about this, but being second-guessed by a mom who has seen one-half of a class this year is so not right. Adam has so far spent his time onstage when he isn't saying a line half-lying on top of a prop suitcase. This bodes ill, I say.

Then today, I got another whammy.

Vince started out in my lower elementary group and complained that it was too babyish for him. His mother complained to my boss that he needed to be challenged more, and insisted he be moved to the older group. OK, that too was done, despite my objections. He did do well in the parent day exercises, he learns lines well and listens to my suggestions and acts on them. So far so good.

Except when I handed out papers to all the students about the upcoming final performance and awards day, his mother hit me with the fact that they'll be out of town that day.

This date has been in stone for months; parents, kids, teachers, everyone has known about it. But since Vince's older brother is receiving an award for some SAT achievement that day, Vince is not supposed to be at his own award ceremony.

Luckily my boss was near when I got the news, and she was exasperated. She asked me to look for another student in another class who might be able to come to the three extra classes in the three weeks before the performance and step in to his part. She told me that if they decide not to come to the performance, he doesn't have to come back to class. Now I am SO GLAD I didn't give him the larger part I debated casting him in. Instead all my actors are girls, half of them playing guys. And now, I have to ask another girl to come play HIS role too in case his parents don't make other arrangements. On top of that, his older brother is in another drama class with a performance on the same day, and they didn't say anything about that brother missing yet, though they knew it as well. I don't even know if that brother is the one getting the award, but if not, that puts TWO brothers out of their performances for the sake of another one.

So I have four weeks. I'm not happy at all about the changes, but I have to make it work. Somehow. I know the problems aren't huge, but when the kids don't do well, I look bad. And when the parents interfere, the kids do less well than otherwise.

I'm going to have to tell them NOT to save the drama for their mama.