"Lifting the Hush"

 

 

Thursday evening, October 25th, my friend Ruby and I attended the opening of the Pacific Grove High School student production of “Lifting the Hush”, written, directed and choreographed by Emily Stewart.

It is a story of a girl with autism whose mother fights to keep her in public school and provides her the skills to maintain who she is and become a whole, functioning and productive person in a world that doesn’t quite understand how she fits in the “normal” world.

 

Emily Stewart, a PGHS senior, wrote this play to bring awareness and understanding of autism.  From what I understand, she has been working on this play for 3 years from very personal experiences taken from having a younger brother who is autistic.  I would like to applaud her for a fine piece of work that was entertaining as well as informative.  The dancing, the music, the sets and the overall performances of all were excellent.  I enjoyed it all and learned something, too.  Emily’s purpose was certainly achieved from my observation.

 

 

Amber's first day at school

 

Ryan describing how he
feels about Amber

Of course, since my grandson, Anthony (Tony, to his PGHS friends), had a starring role made this play so much more interesting and fun as he is such a fine actor... (and I am not biased at all either.) 

 

I will have to say the role of Amber (the autistic girl) was played very well by Maya Mueller.  She had a couple of solo dance routines that showed the confusion and the angst that the autistic person must feel when confronted with challenges and sounds that are not processed well, or rather, processed too well.  Anthony and Maya had scenes together, both scripted and danced, that were very sweet and engaging.

 

 

 

Overall, both Ruby and I enjoyed this production.  I hope others will be able to see and enjoy this play even after it’s run at the PG Performing Arts Center.  John will be going to the performance on Friday nite – I think he will be pleasantly surprised.