New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) in Newark, NJ welcomed Hawthorne High School students on Thursday, May 3, 2012 to their performance of West Side Story. Attending the trip were Alyssa Schlossberg and Jill Hackett’s English classes. Some students who attended the trip took part in Hawthorne High School’s spring drama production, which was also West Side Story. West Side Story is a play about how two people with very different backgrounds can come together as one.

Schlossberg explained the purpose of attending the trip, saying, “West Side Story is considered to be another version of Romeo and Juliet, which is a part of the sophomore curriculum.”

“When I found out that I was going,” said Dustin Scully, student at HHS, “I was really excited to see the difference between our production and NJPAC’s.”  Students were looking forward to watching a play that they also performed.

“I enjoyed both of the productions,” said Kevin McKeown, sophomore at HHS. “HHS had an extremely good performance for a high school production.” Many students enjoyed the play performance from the NJPAC, but many enjoyed HHS’s performance even more.

“I would say that the dancing was one of the best parts of the show,” said Scully. Throughout the play, students were intrigued by the dancing sequences and by how one dancing scene can light up the stage and show the audience how energetic the dancers were. “It makes the show more enjoyable, “said McKeown. “It’s fun to watch everyone working hard and having fun at the same time. I liked the entire play; it kept everybody entertained.”

“I think it was a worthy performance,” said Schlossberg. “It is always interesting to see different takes of classic shows.”