Tag: high school

High school romance skips the clichés

Harper (Anjini Taneja Azhar) and Tilly (Quinn Liebling) share a schoolyard hug in Young Hearts.


By Richard Ades

“Meeting cute” is a common trope of romcoms. In the naturalistic teenage romance Young Hearts, the filmmakers prefer to have their protagonists meet awkward.

The flick centers on two Portland, Oregon, high schoolers: freshman Harper (Anjini Taneja Azhar) and sophomore Tilly (Quinn Liebling). Even though they’ve been neighbors since childhood, they’ve never really talked until they run into each other one day on the way to school. Thanks to Sarah Sherman’s script and sensitive direction by Sherman and her brother, Zachary Ray Sherman, their dialogue captures the stop-and-start conversation of two kids eager to connect but unsure how to proceed.   

When they finally break out of their reticence, it’s due to the slimmest of coincidences: On a subsequent walk home, Harper eyes the fall foliage overhead and makes the offhand comment that she loves leaves. This gives Tilly the excuse to invite her to his room to view his own collection of dried leaves. Thus reassured that they have something in common, they soon surrender to their obvious attraction and fall into a relationship.

What might make the movie uncomfortable for some parents is that this relationship quickly becomes not only sexual but all-encompassing. Even when they’re not together, Harper and Tilly are making plans and sharing thoughts via texts. This would be a major commitment for adults, let alone kids who are aged 14 and 15, respectively. Aren’t they jumping the gun?

That question does come up, but only in a roundabout way. The filmmakers seem less interested in spinning a cautionary tale than they are in reflecting contemporary teenage attitudes and behaviors. They also seem eager to call out the threads of sexism that remain in effect even in a progressive community like Portland. Harper, for example, endures inuendo for being in an intimate relationship, while Tilly encounters friction only from Harper’s brother (Alex Jarmon), who was previously his best friend.

A key element of the film’s success is that the leads are portrayed likably and realistically by Azhar and Liebling. Though the characters have major backstories—Harper was given up for adoption by her Indian mother at age 3, and Tilly recently lost his own mom—it’s their present behavior that defines them the most. Harper is an outspoken feminist who talks about sexual politics on an early date, and Tilly is the kind of kid whose shyness probably makes the school’s drama club an appealing outlet.

Neither is a stereotypical teenager, any more than Young Hearts is a stereotypical high school flick. Instead, it’s a wise and warmhearted look at two youths who discover love and all its complications a few years ahead of schedule.  

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

Young Hearts is available in select theaters and from VOD outlets beginning Feb. 12.

Musicalized high school comedy deserves a passing grade

Mean Girls
Cady (Danielle Wade, left) gets to know Regina (Mariah Rose Faith, second from right) and her fellow “Plastics” in the first national tour of Mean Girls. (Photo by Joan Marcus)

By Richard Ades

Tina Fey’s satirical wit comes across in everything she does, whether it’s Saturday Night Live, 30 Rock or the clever 2004 flick she wrote and co-starred in, Mean Girls. It also comes across in the musical version of the flick, now holding forth at the Ohio Theatre.

It comes across eventually, that is. The stage show is encumbered by several songs and dances that seem to be copied from the Broadway playbook, especially in the early scenes. But by the time the darkly comic plot kicks into gear, Fey’s distinctive voice is clearly heard.

Mean Girls is the story of Cady Heron (Danielle Wade), an American teen who was born and raised in Kenya but must move to the U.S. when her mother’s job is relocated. Since Cady has been homeschooled all her life, she feels doubly out of place when she stumbles into her first day at a Chicago high school.

Luckily for her, outcasts Damien and Janis (Eric Huffman and Mary Kate Morrissey) take it on themselves to lead her through the school’s minefield of a social scene. They describe each clique in detail, but they save their sternest caution for the “Plastics,” a trio of divas led by Regina (Mariah Rose Faith), an alpha female whose beauty and viciousness make her a figure of both envy and fear.

Despite their warnings, Cady lets herself be courted by the haughty group, which also includes the needy Gretchen (Megan Masako Haley) and the hilariously dense Karen (Jonalyn Saxer). She soon learns the hard way that Regina is just as evil as she’s been told. She also learns, too late, that the Plastics’ shallow, self-centered lifestyle is dangerously addictive.

What makes Cady such a perfect guide into Fey’s version of high school purgatory is that she’s a tabula rasa. Raised in a land of beast-filled savannahs and star-filled skies, she knows nothing of a society where friends and social media “likes” are touted as signs of popularity. She also knows nothing about boys or the lengths to which girls will go to capture their attention, including downplaying their own intelligence. Most of all, she knows nothing of the cutthroat competition girls sometimes wage with each other out of insecurity and jealousy.

All of this comes across in the musical just as it did on the big screen, though not quite as succinctly. Jeff Richmond’s music, Nell Benjamin’s lyrics and Casey Nicholaw’s choreography sometimes create numbers that seem to be straight out of Broadway Musical 101. The most self-conscious is “Stop,” the tap number that opens Act 2. Though entertainingly performed by Huffman’s Damien and a group of backup dancers, it seems too old-hat to belong in a modern high school.

More up to date, even though it does little to advance the plot, is the hip-hop-inspired “Whose House Is This?” And more creative is the Act 1 number “Where Do You Belong?”—which is fun despite “choreography” that largely consists of pushing tables and chairs around a lunchroom.

Best of all are the numbers that encapsulate the message of Fey’s cautionary tale. Among them are Janis and Cady’s “Apex Predator,” with its James Bond-like blares, and the uplifting finale, “I See Stars.”

Mean Girls has arrived in Columbus remarkably fast: It opened on Broadway only a year and a half ago and began its first national tour just last month. Despite the speed, the show at the Ohio is technologically polished. Director Nicholaw, scenic designer Scott Pask, lighting designer Kenneth Posner and others have joined forces to create a production that changes times and locales both colorfully and instantaneously.

More importantly, the cast is nearly perfect from both an acting and singing standpoint. Huffman is an early standout as Damian, despite playing a character that is little more than a gay stereotype. Among those making an impression in smaller roles are Adante Carter as Cady’s math-class crush and Gaelen Gilliland as her supportive teacher.

As for the leads, Wade makes us believe the huge metamorphoses Cady undergoes in the course of the show, while Faith actually leaves us feeling sorry for Regina after her fortunes change.

Well, just a little. It’s still nice to see at least one “mean girl” get a taste of her own medicine.

Broadway in Columbus and CAPA will present Mean Girls through Oct. 27 at the Ohio Theatre, 39 E. State St., Columbus. Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. through Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday. Running time: 2 hours, 35 minutes (including intermission). Tickets are $39-$139+. 614-469-0939, 1-800-745-3000, columbus.broadway.com, capa.com or ticketmaster.com.