Recess! Media

It’s the season when high schools around the country are putting on their spring musicals. That high school institution is the subject of a popular new Disney movie and a soundtrack that’s been climbing the best-seller charts this spring. The film is called, generically, High School Musical, and, in some ways, its plot and its tunes are oh, so predictable. Two young people, Troy and Gabriella, meet at a karaoke contest. She’s a brainiac, he’s a jock, but, in the midst of the music they make together, something happens, “Something New.”

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The only problem is that their friends don’t want them to go on singing together. “Stick to the Status Quo,” each of the competing, self-isolating groups tell them.

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Ah, but, when you’re meant to sing, you’re meant to sing — and be a star intellect or athlete. It’s just a matter of “Breaking Free,” as Troy and Gabriella discover, almost effortlessly. One wishes for a little more depth and complexity of flavor in this soufflé. But, hey, it’s springtime, time for things, including those tried and true anthems to soaring, youthful hopes, to bud and flower again.

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