“Hairspray” Takes Home High School Tonys

At the Halo Awards, celebrating the best in Connecticut’s high school theater, Wilbur Cross High School received 14 nominations for its March production of the loud, brash, socially charged, and subversively smart musical Hairspray — and took home two awards.

Director Jen Frechette and a contingent of Wilbur Cross students and staff traveled to the Palace Theater in Waterbury to attend the ceremony on Wednesday evening. The two-night event involved 64 schools from across the state. Wilbur Cross’s nominations ranged from best performance by a featured actress in a musical (Allison Hardy), to best lighting and sound design (Camille Fortin and Sam Smith, respectively) to best orchestra, dancing, and chorus, to best performance by a leading actor in a contemporary musical (Luis DeJesus).

DeJesus won his award. And the entire chorus won theirs, with Brianna Chance receiving the Gypsy Award as one of its members.

The Halo Award wins were in part ​“a testament to the hard work and dedication that Jen Frechette puts into her teaching and production. She worked tirelessly since October to create what was clearly an amazing show,” wrote William McKinney, a Wilbur Cross teacher, to the Independent. But of course, the awards also recognized what New Haveners who had seen the show already knew — that the Wilbur Cross theater crew had put on a production that really did clear up, as the play’s protagonist Tracy Turnblad puts it, ​“the acne of the soul.”