Rodney Curtis

Taylor and Skye on stage in their Drowsy Chaperone accouterment.

It’s great watching my daughters on stage. Bittersweet though. This is the last play, for a while anyway, that will feature them both. The Drowsy Chaperone, a comedic romp through the late 1920s, is now playing at Troy High School. Our girls are on and off stage for most all of the show. One alternates between dressing as a freaky looking organ grinder’s monkey and a high society maid. The other is a brainless widow who can’t seem to control her spit-takes, but also plays the ukelele. High comedy.

I can’t help but think back to their earliest dramatic presentations, cobbled together from whatever “costumes” we had lying around. Their plays back then were barely scripted one-acts in which the whole point was to simply dress up. Stuffed animals were husbands. Blue blankets were lakes or shawls or baby slings. Tutus meant endless hours of fun.

We’d sit, my wife and I, politely watching their shows. We’d clap when we thought they were done, only to be scolded because the play was still going on. Sometimes Grandma would play the role of audience. When larger groups got together, cousins would combine and the traveling troupe told tales to rapt audiences of aunts and uncles.

So it amuses me endlessly that these days we actually pay to watch what used to be performed in our own private living rooms, with pretend paper tickets. We get together for dinner ahead of time, then drive off to see the cousins acting or working behind the scenes in amazingly lavish productions. Or family makes the journey here to do the same thing with our daughters on the stage.

I’m only seeing the show three times, slacker that I am. Grandma is seeing four performances and Marci will punch in five times. We’re not doing this to be polite. We all truly enjoy the play and amaze ourselves at our willingness to shell out the money time and again.

There’s nothing profound about parental pride. It’s exciting to watch the progression from toddler to thespian. Maybe they’ll dance and sing and act together in some far flung future once college is over and careers hold sway.

Or maybe in some distant living room, there’s a sister act whose early lines are being written as we speak. Until then, we’ll relish the rest of this run as we await their upcoming solo performances.

Places, everybody.

Taylor and Skye perform an original song and dance number 15 years ago.