When we agreed to let Ella and Lia audition for Matilda back in June, we also had to agree to fly them to Atlanta for MLK weekend to participate in the Junior Theater Festival, the largest youth theater festival in the world. If you are a theater nerd, it's like you have died and gone to theater heaven. There were 6,500 people in attendance from 124 theater groups from 30 states and 5 countries. After performing Matilda in August, their cast continued to have Saturday afternoon practice September through December. They then practiced four days a week for the first two weeks in January before the entire cast and many parents flew out on the January 11th. What we weren't planning on was having a major Alaska Airlines fiasco in each direction as the majority of the 70 people from our group had cancelled flights flying there and back due to the grounding of the Boeing Max planes after a door fell off of one of their planes less than a week before we left. Although this caused major drama and stress the day before we left (and a little more drama two days before we flew back home), I was able to get the girls and I on alternate flights each way. Airline drama set aside, we spent three, 12-hour days in a massive convention center in Atlanta called the Cobb Galleria. In addition to multiple rehearsals and performing in front of a panel of three adjudicators, the kids attended various workshops, watched other theater groups in their pod perform, and attended multiple concerts where Broadway stars told their stories and sang incredible songs. It was absolutely amazing experience! On the final day of the festival, our theater won a trophy for "Overall Excellence in Dance" at the Awards Ceremony which was a massive accomplishment. Although I was completely exhausted after a whirlwind weekend, I am so grateful that I was able to go on this exciting adventure with my girls and watch them have the time of their lives with their theater friends!
January 11th:
After rescheduling our direct, Alaska flight to two United flights (with a connection in San Francisco), the girls and I were surprised to find several other theater families on the same flight as us. Here is Lia and Ella with their directors and a few of their friends at the Seattle airport bright and early for our 6:40 flight to San Francisco.
Hannah, Maggie, and Ella bravely decided to sing and dance for money while waiting in the San Francisco airport. Sadly, only theater families donated money to their hat. ;-)
January 12th:
After a long travel day, all Matilda cast members and their families made it to Atlanta by midnight the day before. The next morning, we met in the convention center for several practices before their 7 pm performance in front of the judges. Here are Jen and Blair instructing the cast during a practice.
A cast photo taken under the infamous, JTF arch inside the large room that connects the convention center to the fancy, Waverly Hotel.
Lia and two of her closest theater buddies, Abbie and Marcus, waiting for the Festival Kick-Off to begin inside the massive convention hall that fit all 6,500 people.
Ella sitting between her closest Matilda friends, Madelyn, Evie, and Neah before the Kick-Off began.
The cast did an amazing job performing their 15-minute cut of Matilda for the judges that evening. They have been working on this all fall and it was so fun to see them finally perform it in person. Here is Lia singing, "School Song."
Lia and Braden lifting Ella up during "School Song."
Ella singing during, "Smell of Rebellion."
The final pose of the group at the end of their cut. Lia is in the back and Ella is at the front right of the photo.
All three judges spoke to the cast one at a time after their performance was over and gave such positive feedback. Here is the first judge talking to them after their performance was over.
The cast then moved to a smaller room for a 30-minute discussion with another JTF employee.
At one point in their performance, Noah picked up Ella and lifted her in this awesome position around the stage. Since I missed getting a picture of it during the performance, he agreed to recreate it after the group discussion was over.
We finished off our first long day with a group photo at the Media Blitz center.
The girls and I then went to the store to shop for JTF merchandise and then wandered around the incredible, Broadway Junior displays and took some fun photos. It was a great time to do this as it was almost 9 p.m. and this photo area was practically empty. Here is one of few pictures that I was in with the girls all weekend long.
The girls and I posing in front of the BeetleJuice Jr. poster.
Since Alice and Wonderland is the new Disney Broadway Junior musical being released this year, there was a massive display with multiple photo ops. Here are the girls sitting at the Mad Hatter's tea party.
And posing with the card soldiers in the queen's garden.
Lia and Ella posing with friends in front of the PlayBill area.
January 13th:
We headed back to the convention center on Saturday morning to participate in a singing workshop. After that, we went and watched a few other theater groups in our pod perform in front of the judges. We then had our lunch break in the hallway that kind of became our "hang out" area. During this time, our theater group started its on "My Pony" game which several other groups joined in on. This is a singing and dancing game that pops up all weekend long and all over the convention center. It grows and grows and goes for hours if allowed. Ella absolutely loved it and played it as much as she could all weekend long.
Another fun thing that Ella loved doing all weekend long was trading wristbands with other theater groups. Our directors gave each child a bag full of Matilda wristbands on the first morning of the first day and Ella traded out all of them by the end of the weekend. Here is Ella with a few of her friends counting and comparing their wristbands after they were done eating lunch.
After attending another concert in the massive conference room where we listened to several Broadway stars perform, we ran into two of them inside the Waverly Hotel. I managed to get a group picture with the two children who had just finished playing Leisel and Rudy in The Book Thief on the West End in London.
The kids then attended a dance workshop in the late afternoon before breaking for dinner. Here is Ella and her friends practicing their dance.
We then returned back to the convention hall for another 8 pm performance called the "New Works Showcase" where we watched five theater groups perform five Broadway Jr. Shows that are being released this year including Alice in Wonderland Jr. and Beetlejuice Jr.
A group photo we took of our kids together in the convention hall after our directors announced the shows they are putting on this coming summer (Frozen, The Lion King, and Shrek). Sadly, Lia and Ella will not be able to participate due to our travel schedule, but it was still fun to be the first to hear the announcement.
January 14th:
After a slower morning, we met back up at the convention center at 10 a.m. for another concert in the conference room. The kids then attended an acting workshop that the parents were able to sit in on.
Ella pretending to be a candle stick.
After the workshop, our group met up in our same area for lunch a third day in a row. As always, Ella had lots of fun playing around with her friends and had me take this ridiculous picture with her friend Hannah (whose legs are wrapped around her head). We then went and attended two back to back events in the convention center.
The second meeting was the Freddie G Awards Ceremony where they announced that our theater had won the Overall Excellence in Dance award. Our cast was so excited and screamed so loud when our theater's name was called.
The entire group posing with the trophy after the ceremony was over!
We all raced back to our hotel after the awards ceremony to get changed into our fancy clothes for the final event of the weekend called the JTF Concert. We ate dinner in our hotel lobby and took a huge group picture with all of the kids from our group and another theater group from Kentucky who had stayed in the same hotel with us all weekend long.
After arriving back at the Cobb Galleria for the last time, the girls and I had our picture taken while wearing our fancy dresses.
We then spent the evening being entertained by the dynamic, Broadway duo, Arielle and Adam Jacobs. This is a brother and sister combo who have performed in multiple Broadway productions over the past twenty years. Adam was the original Aladdin on Broadway and Arielle played Jasmine once the show went on the road. They told their entire story from childhood to Broadway stars and sang multiple songs throughout. It was incredible evening!
They finished off their concert by singing, "A Whole New World," which was absolutely amazing! Needless to say, we all sang along!
We then finished off the evening by heading back to the adjacent Waverly Hotel to get a group picture of the cast and directors all dressed in their best!
Lia and Abbie in their little, black dresses.
On our way out of the Waverly Hotel to head back to our hotel at the end of a very long day, we ran into Tilley Raye-Bayer again. Since Ella wasn't with us the day before when we met her, we were so excited to find her waiting for the elevator as we were walking out of the hotel. I was so grateful for the chance that I had to introduce Ella to her and get a picture of them together with Ella's friend, Madelyn. It was the perfect way to end our whirlwind, 3-day JTF experience!
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