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Drama High: The Incredible True Story Of A Brilliant Teacher, A Struggling Town, And The Magic Of Theater (2013)

by Michael Sokolove(Favorite Author)

4.09 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

1594488223 (ISBN13: 9781594488221)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Riverhead Hardcover

review 1: "Levittown had no Main Street or downtown, no culture, not a single thing of visual interest. Its poverty was of a particular kind--lack of imagination, color, zest." This wasn't my experience. I grew up "south of Route 1" as Sokolove puts it so many times, but barely, and don't claim to have had the same experiences as Bristol Township L-towners of the 2010s, but it's my hometown. At least that's what the tatoo on the inside of my left arm says. Levittown had range. Sokolove only speaks to part of it, and acts like it's the whole town. But he's right that race was and is the exception. The chapter on the race restrictions in Levittown's history is a very dark chapter, one I didn't fully realize until I read this book. The Truman Drama program was a footnote for me -- I re... moread the book for Levittown -- but the character of Lou Volpe is truly inspiring, and helps us dream about what teachers can still be, even perhaps in Philadelphia where I now live. A fascinating detail is that Darryl Hart, a snarky but captivating historian at my old seminary (currently an author/blogger), was one of the author's childhood friends and a product of the Truman High School Drama Program. It came out of nowhere, but I can see how his attitude came out of Levittown. I think I'll write him a letter.
review 2: As a fan of theater and musicals, the most captivating parts of this book for me were the sections that describe the process of putting together a play. This book is well-written and well-paced. The author does a great job of explaining exactly what makes Lou Volpe, as well as Truman High and its students, special, but I feel that he sometimes did this at the expense of putting down other unnamed drama programs, making sweeping and, at times, unfair generalizations about what other high schools are like (especially those in affluent areas). Sometimes resorts to Page-Six style language: "An unnamed high school only 15 minutes away..." I could have done without the cattiness. less

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