The preparations behind the new Davis High musical “Ranked”

By Chloe Chedin,

BlueDevilHUB.com Staff–

Excitement is in the air as the Davis High drama department is preparing for their first play of the year, “Ranked.”

Written by Kyle Holmes and composed by David Taylor Gomes, “Ranked” focuses on a high school where your class rank determines your future. The play follows the life of a high school student named Lily who is struggling to keep herself above average in the ranks. 

Holmes and Gomes created this play as a way to shed light on the pressure students face to get good grades and to get into prestigious colleges. 

To prepare for the play, the drama department will be hosting auditions on Sept. 19, Sept. 20 and Sept. 23. They will also be hosting a musical workshop on Sept. 17 to teach the auditionees the music from “Ranked.”

Junior Maya Bailey is hoping to be part of the “Ranked” cast. Bailey is already preparing for her audition.

“For this one and for most auditions, I’ll do some research on the show and look up the plot and the characters. I’ll try and find a script online if I can or try and find a past production from another company and I’ll look at it and I’ll compare how people interpret specific characters and I base my perception of the show based on that,” Bailey said.

Junior Annika Fisk is preparing for her audition as well.

“I am going to go to the workshop […] where they are going to teach us the music and I’m also researching a little bit more about the show so I can know as much as possible for the audition,” Fisk said.

Shenandoah Kehoe, the instructor of the stage crafting class at DHS, is starting to prepare the students by familiarizing them with the tools in the workshop and the Brunelle theater. They haven’t received the plans for building the set yet.

“I can tell you from a lot of experience that theater shows always come together, even when it seems impossible that they will, so I’m confident the set will be ready,” Kehoe said. 

Junior Cassidy Carlson, a stage-crafting student, explains the steps taken by the class to make the set.

“You prepare by building the set, basically. I mean everything that needs to be built, the stage craft class builds. And then we have one big load in day where you attach everything to the stage,” Carlson said.

The date of the musical is to be determined.