The production of youth theater increases from the ashes of Los Angeles Fires

Los Angeles –

The day after her house burned down, Lara sent a group of the youth theater troop to the youth theater troops: they did not let the fire storm of Los Angeles stop their upcoming show.

“So many of our castmates have lost everything,” wrote entirely, the director of the youth theater in a beloved playhouse in the Pacific Palisades. “We will continue with the rehearsals. I am confident that we will find a stage.”

The devastating fire on January 7th revolved every customs of the Pierson Playhouse with 125 seats from the basement to the roof and only left a mutilated steel skeleton. Many of the young actors watched it on live television. About half of the 45 actors of the show between the ages of 8 and 17 lost their houses or cannot yet return due to serious damage. Many have also lost their schools through the fire.

But the show continued. A two -week run of the musical Crazy about you Opened last weekend in a nearby school defense and marked a triumphal return to the stage for a community that is determined to climb out of the ash. Five other shows are planned for this weekend.

Experience raised the young artists of the theater palisades from an unfathomable low point and taught them the healing power of art in the face of the catastrophe.

“When I was happy for the first time after the fire, I was when I entered this first rehearsal,” said Callum Ganz, 17, the director's son, who plays a cowboy with a tatta dance on the show. “When I sing or dance, I forget everything else. I don't think of the fire. Everything I feel is luck.”

“It's always a shock,” he said, “if it comes back to me and I remember: 'Oh, right. My house is gone.'”

More than 6,800 houses and other structures were flattened in the palisade fire. Additional options, shops and schools were destroyed together with the most popular hangouts in the city center -the local skate shop, a pizza location, the yoghurt shop, in which the young actors run to a solemn pleasure after shows.

The idea of ​​reconstruction is still a distant dream. The fire destroyed the performance room and everything else – hundreds of costumes and shoes in the wardrobe department on the ground floor, vintage and new props, your piano and other musical instruments, lights and sound equipment.

The parents went to social media and publish requests for donations. They came across the generosity of the artistic community, which extended from Hollywood to Broadway.

Emmy Award winner Friseur Joy Zapata saw one of the contributions, sent the mother who wrote an email to ensure that it was not a fraud and then made friends in the shop.

“I did horror films with 100 extras on the Pacific Coast Highway. But this time the story was real and she blew me away,” said Zapata. During the clothes samples, she held a tutorial for the line -up and then returned with a team of seven Hollywood hair and mask pictures for the opening evening.

“I wanted these children to feel beautiful,” said Zapata when she rolled and sprayed the hair of show girls into extended rolls. Cowgirls got braided braids.

A few weeks earlier the Broadway actress Kerry Butler, a Tony-nominated star of beetleHad invited the children to sing with her during a concert in Orange County, south of Los Angeles. Then she spent a day leading her in a master class for character development and vocal technology.

“I will never forget my time with them,” Butler wrote on Instagram. “I met people who lost their houses, schools. But they told me when they heard that the theater was gone – then they felt the deepest loss.”

The group also received wireless microphones from the Guitar Center and costumes from neighboring schools. The Paul Revere Middle School has initially become the troop's house.

“Home” is an charged word in a community in which so many have lost their. But it fits for these young actors and their families.

“I learn that a home is not a physical thing. It is people,” said Scarlett Shelton, a 16-year-old from the nearby Culver City, who has been part of the theater since the middle school.

It is the type of Kleinstadtpielhaus that no longer exists in many parts of the country. Children join Young and stay up to the high school and often go with dreams from Broadway. About half of the children lived nearby in the Pacific palisades, and the rest comes from the Los Angeles area.

On the opening evening in a new venue, a large part of the pre-show jitter and rituals felt the same. The big children helped to calm the nerves of the “Little”, as the young actors are lovingly called. Before the show, the entire line -up circled behind the curtain and alternately changed inspiring PEP talks. “Pour off your socks!” said a child. Another appeared to say: “Everyone, dance the night away!”

Seting the show was not the main goal when her group text emitted completely when her own family evacuated and then learned that her home was gone.

“On this day of the fires, her whole life was destroyed in a few hours. But it wasn't, 'woe, I lost everything,” said choreographer Rebecca Barragan. “She said, 'We have to have a sample immediately and bring these children back on their feet. And let them know that life is not over yet.”

The original line -up of 58 children faded to 45 when families were scattered in new houses. Many are involved in a bureaucracy according to the wild fire of the insurance and state support and have still found out where they should go next.

“Being with the other children and creating something and having a purpose was the most healing thing for all of us,” said Wendy Levine, whose sixth grader Tyler is on the show.

“It was a light in the dark,” said her husband Eric Levine. The family had just rebuilt their home and unpacked boxes on January 7 on January 7 when they were ordered to evacuate. They learned that the house was gone that night.

Ironic, Crazy about you It is about a small town theater that fights for survival and affects the music of George and Ira Gershwin. As the story says, Townsfolk are energized by getting together to create a show after their hometown has been hit with difficult times.

This is how the real life felt in the last few weeks, said Sebastian Florido, 14, who plays the main character and loved to reach a number in particular – in particular – I can't be disturbed nowIn the power of the song and the dance to rejuvenate bad news.

“One of the lines is: 'I dance and I can't take care of it now,” said the teenager. “It is really assignable. All this bad stuff happened, but I kill with my best friends. It was like a short vacation to a small paradise.”