Arts & Entertainment

Not Just For Tweens

All About
Ashley

Nate Bloom
Special to the Jewish News

The cast of High
School Musical: The
Concert includes,
left to right, Monique
Coleman, Corbin
Bleu, Ashley Tisdale,
Vanessa Hudgens,
Drew Seeley and
Lucas Gabreel.

The cast of the blockbuster Disney hit movie
High School Musical performs in concert at the Palace.

Suzanne Chessler
Special to the Jewish News

igh School Musical the film, the triple-Platinum
CD, the stage play, the concert and the foundation for
the upcoming film sequel — might seem to be just
for kids but not according to David Lawrence, the composer
who scored the movies and did some songwriting for all of it.
Michigan audiences will get the chance to see for themselves
as High School Musical: The Concert is performed Tuesday
evening, Jan. 16, at the Palace of Auburn Hills. Performers
include movie cast members Ashley Tisdale (Sharpay), Corbin
Bleu (Chad), Monique Coleman (Taylor), Lucas Grabeel (Ryan)
and Vanessa Hudgens (Gabriella). Zac Efron (Troy Bolton),
currently busy filming the movie musical Hairspray, will be
replaced by Drew Seeley for the concert.
"The movie succeeded on so many levels," says Lawrence,
46, an R&B music man before branching out to television and
film. "It's a great message, and it's a clean message. It's a fun
message, and it's laced with really cool songs that kids, parents
and grandparents can sing and dance to!'
Lawrence, a graduate of New York's Mannes College of
Music, originally had visions of a classical career but moved
into more commercial projects as he looked for work that
related to his personal outlook.
"When I look at the concert, I'm so impressed that these
actors are able to do the same thing live that they were able to
do in the movie," Lawrence says. "You can do a lot of things on
film that are hard to re-create in the real world.
"They did a fabulous job of putting the concert together, and

—

the actors that were familiar from the film — with the addi-
tion of Drew Seeley — are so talented. It's a different kind of
palpable energy when you see them live."
The theme of the show — be true to yourself — is captured
in the song "Stick to the Status Quo," which Lawrence wrote
with his wife, Faye Greenberg.
"It's a plot-driven song that starts out saying, 'Don't be dif-
ferent:" Lawrence explains. "By the end of the song, it says that
it's a good thing to be different."
Susan Hurwitz, in charge of the theater program at Pioneer
High School in Ann Arbor, found the film irresistible and led
her students in producing the stage version in the fall.
"We live in cynical times, so it was a very positive feeling to
see people of all ages moved by this production:' Hurwitz says.
"We were overwhelmed by the number of people who saw our
show, which seems to have messages that everyone hungers for
— getting along and accepting people who are different."
Hannah Jacobson, a Pioneer senior and president of the high
school's theater guild, liked working on a happy show.
"It's incredible to take something new and put our own
stamp on it:' she says. "People were excited about seeing it."
Rebecca Rothman, a Pioneer senior who served as stage
manager of the musical, also related to the upbeat mood and
joined in as the backstage crew found moments to dance along
to the music.
Lawrence and Greenberg, who were writing partners before
becoming marriage partners, had written songs for Earth,
Wind & Fire, Stephanie Mills and other pop performers.

Not Just For Tweens on page 43

A

shley Tisdale, 21, who co-starred in
the Disney film High School Musical
as "nasty girl" Sharpay Evans, will
sing several solo numbers when the concert
version of the show comes to the Palace of
Auburn Hills on Jan. 16. Besides High School
Musical, Tisdale is best known for playing the
much nicer Maddie Fitzpatrick on the Disney
TV series The Suite Life of Zack and Cody.
Tisdale was born in West Deal, N.J., and
was signed by her current agent, Bill Perlman,
who saw her performing at a shopping
mall when she was just 3 years old. Ashley's
first stage appearances were in musicals put
on at the JCC of Greater Monmouth County in
Deal Park, N.J. She sang for President Clinton
at the White House when she was 12.
In the late 1990s, Tisdale and her parents
relocated to Los Angeles,
where Ashley appeared as
a guest star on many TV
series. In 2005, she landed
her current role in Suite
Life, but her career really
took off with the success
of High School Musical.
Her first solo album,
Headstrong, will be
released next month, and
she will appear in High
School Musical 2, a
Ashley Tisdale
film sequel due out this
summer.
Last summer, Tisdale did a special solo
appearance at the JCC of Greater Monmouth
County's new theater to benefit Maccabi
ArtsFest, a teen arts program open to Jewish
teens 13-16 from around the world. This sum-
mer's ArtsFest will be held in two locations:
the JCC of Greater Monmouth and the Adolph
and Rose Levis JCC in Boca Raton, Fla. (For
info on Maccabi ArtsFest, go to
www.jccmaccabiartsfest.org .)
Ashley's mother, Lisa Morris Tisdale, is
Jewish (her father, Mike, is not), and Ashley
identifies as Jewish. Her family attends
High Holiday services at a Los Angeles-area
synagogue. Her older sister, Jennifer, also is
an actress. Ashley's maternal grandfather,
Arnold Morris, was the inventor of the Ginsu
knife. 1

January

2007

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