Canterbury School

Every school that participated in this year’s High School Musical Awards was a winner just by virtue of making it that far, but four schools had exceptional nights during the awards portion of the program.

The High School Musical Theatre Awards take place at 7 p.m. on Friday, May 8 at the Barbara B Mann Performing Art Hall at FSW. Patterned after the Tony Awards, the evening features performances by each participating school, along with awards in a number of categories, including Best Overall Production, Best Ensemble and Best Actor and Supporting Actor in both Male-Identifying and Female-Identifying roles.

“I’d like to have a chance to go to Broadway and beyond; maybe do movies and other things like that,” said JJ Freitas outside Fort Myers Theatre recently. Freitas has taken two big steps in pursuit of those lofty goals. First, he traveled with Fort Myers Theater to the Junior Theatre Festival in Atlanta in January. It’s the Super Bowl of student-driven musical theater.

Food can bring people together, but can it also tell the story of a culture’s past? The Jewish Federation of Lee and Charlotte County put that idea to the test.

Lehigh Senior High School had a huge night on Friday at the High School Musical Theatre Awards. Its spring show, “Hadestown Teen Edition,” was selected by a panel of five judges as this year’s winner in the coveted category of “Overall Production of a Musical.” The awards didn’t stop there.

Patterned after the Tony Awards, the evening features performances by each participating school along with awards in a number of categories.

Sophia Brook has been performing on stage from a young age. The Canterbury senior has already appeared in 33 shows, including Anne Boleyn in “Six the Musical” and leads in “Mary Poppins,” “The Wizard of Oz,” “Grease,” “Mean Girls” and “Beauty & the Beast,” as well as in the award-winning independent film “The Remedy.” So it didn’t surprise her guidance counselor when Sophia said she wanted to apply to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. But they both knew the odds were long on getting accepted there, even with her resume. But she not only got in, she earned a full tuition scholarship as well.

Two of the more than 30 people injured in what is being termed as a terror attack in New Orleans Wednesday morning have been confirmed as former students from the Canterbury School in Fort Myers.Congressman Byron Donalds on Wednesday posted the names of the two injured students, Elle Eisele and Steele Idelson, both 2023 graduates of Canterbury. Social media posts say Eisele is studying at the University of Georgia while Idelson is attending San Diego State University.Further details on their injuries were not available.

Connecting with others can be difficult in the digital age. But it was especially tough during the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s when a Lee County student decided to break the barrier.