Be excellent to each other

Photo: Bonnie Gratz

Connor Knapp, Darcy Dyck, Brock Gratz, and Justin Gaudio

OKM Variety Show

It is not often that I am needed just to support an event, as usually I am the one running the show, something that is both an exhilarating and exhausting. This week, however, I have the great pleasure of being able to watch another group’s great undertaking take flight. 

The OKM Grad 2016’s Variety Show, which took the stage on February 23 at Kelowna Community Theatre, is an annual event put on by Grade 12 students at OKM, with the support of Grad Council parent volunteers. This year’s parent coordinators are the incredible Jennifer Knapp and Luanne Warren, along with long time Grad Advisor, OKM teacher Mr. Matheson. 

From the very beginning, Mr. Matheson has advised the kids that although they would need some help from parents, they were to do this on their own. So they have, and what a great experience it has been to watch from the wings as it all came together.

Emily Friesen, superstar school triple threat and all-round cool kid, took the lead in writing and directing the show, with the theme ‘Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure’. From there, my son, Brock Gratz, designed a poster and set. 

Photo: Bonnie Gratz

Brock and his set

It was an exercise in humility for my husband and me when a group of high school students showed up at our house one rainy afternoon to paint the set, moving the pre-planned outdoor process into our garage, which is known in our neighbourhood to be a very strange, crowded, and crazy place. all the while other kids were coming up with their own dance numbers, raps, scenes, and more. 

Jenn and Luanne definitely had to get parents organized -Justin Gaudio’s mum, Kristina, has done a tremendous job of borrowing vintage costumes from places like Georgie Girl (thank you!), and other parents - Colette, Natalie, and Karen, were busy with a multitude of production-related duties, from running things backstage, and getting volunteers, decorations, and donations. That doesn’t begin to cover the 149 items the team on the silent auction worked so hard to find. 

My husband and I came in at the end, working on production - a drop in the bucket, compared to the hundreds of hours these volunteers have spent on the project.

In the end, it has all been the grads. I want to call them kids, but they are young men and women. I have been watching them together over the last few days, and you can see, in an event like this, that they are not kids anymore. Sure, they love to have fun and be silly, but they are most certainly well on their way to adulthood.

Last night at our dress rehearsal, they stepped on the Kelowna Community Theatre stage with a confidence and maturity that was truly thrilling, especially considering that so many of them had never performed before. They put their heart into it, as though it was the most important thing they had ever done. Some are more experienced than others, but they all care, are sweet and supportive of each other, and are ‘most excellent’.

Through the leadership of gifted students like Emily Friesen, this group of grads has created a successful and inspired show. It is theirs. How lucky I am to be backstage with them, cheering them on and seeing it happen the way they want it to happen.

Regrettably, by the time you read this, the show run is over. That is the bittersweet nature of theatre, for it is, like life, wonderful and fleeting. Let’s take a lead from the kids - the young adults - of OKM’s Grad 2016 class and ‘be excellent to each other’.

Photo: Bonnie Gratz (design by Brock Gratz)

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.