It has been one week since the last show of Hairspray and you may have seen the many people who wore Hairspray hoodies as a way to remember those 3 fabulous performance nights last week.

Over the past few days, I even heard some Hairspray members say that without the regular after school rehearsals until 6pm, they felt quite empty and too free. Although I was just a single person from the backstage crew, I felt so empty last week that I went home on Tuesday and Thursday asking myself what I should do with my free time.

For the past 4 months, the cast and crew of Hairspray practiced and met each other regularly every week even though we only performed it for 3 nights. What I noticed is that even if you haven’t talked or you don’t know many of the people that were a part of Hairspray, by the end of the 4 months and the week before the play every single person that was a part of the musical feels like family. Especially in the last week, when rehearsals started from 3:30pm and ended at 7:30pm. That was the time when everyone started to feel the heat of the play and even I, as a part of the backstage crew, started feeling nervous and worried.

It’s been a week and I still remember the feelings, the excitement of the first night. Everything seemed to be normal and calm as usual from 3:30 to 4:30. However, things got busy at around 5:00 and everyone started feeling the pressure. Our four month rehearsals were all a preparation for these three nights and this was our first. This first night felt the most important as it took a crucial role in making the audience decide whether they would recommend others to watch our musical or not. When the last stage rehearsal was over right before the actual show, I started feeling more and more excited as I saw the theatre seats filling up with people. The first show went by so fast. 4 months practicing, and only 2 hours to perform and I kept thinking about how I would only have two more nights to spend time with the Hairspray crew and cast while doing the same job that I was doing.

Saturday was our last night and I began to realize that this would be the last night I would be with this crew. That night, while we wished each other good luck by saying the usual, “break a leg,” I felt touched when I saw some people going up to hug Ms. Caster.

The last show lasted longer than the previous ones. The cast, stepped forward and did a thank you speech for all the teachers that had helped and been a part of the musical as the applause got louder and louder. As the curtains started to close, I started to feel empty and I made sure to listen carefully to every song of the play.

It has been one week since Hairspray ended and I still hear people humming to some of the Hairspray songs. They’re still so familiar, like it just happened yesterday and as Ms. Caster said on the final day of Hairspray, “You might forget math formulas or equations as you graduate. But this kind of memory, this play, you can never forget it.”