On Friday, November 3, I saw the “25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” at Urbana. This hilarious and witty play surpassed my own expectations with every joke and moment of realness that is in the show.

This play about an elementary school spelling bee made me both cackle in laughter, and pause with goosebumps during the performance.

The audience laughed at the jokes at just the right moment, applauded the cast members whenever there was a particularly flawless execution, and was utterly silent during the more serious and sad parts of the play.

The acting of everyone in the show was incredible, and after listening to the official soundtrack, they perfectly captured the feel of the characters. Every cast member performed each character as if they were them.

In particular, the performance of “The I Love You Song” gave me goosebumps from the powerful performance. Sydney Austin encapsulated the sadness and eeriness of the song with her well done execution and performance as Olive Ostrovsky.

The technical aspects of this show were well done and certainly added to the performance. Like when Olive Ostrovsky’s parents were singing to her during “The I Love You Song”.

The stage light was lowered with only a three places of lighting. A spotlight on Olive, and a dimmer, cool toned light behind each parent, creating a detail of anonymity for those two characters. It adds to the already melancholy theme of the song, taking it to another level.

For this play, it is commonplace to have audience participation by asking random audience members to act as spellers in the show. This feature was… (To read the rest of this story, pick up a copy of The Hawkeye from the newsstand near the front office or the media center)