
With two All-State award-winning groups, Readers Theatre and Short Film "One Last Night", and plenty of Division I rated groups, tonight's annual Wintertainment will be better a night not to miss. The speech team performance will be at 7:00 p.m. Feb. 21 in the Audubon High School auditorium. Admission fee is $5 for adults and $3 for students, and there will also be a free-will donation dessert buffet. Donations are important for the speech team; it helps pay for costumes, scripts, props, and other speech-related expenses. People that want to laugh, cry, and be entertained should come out tonight and enjoy the wonderful large group speech team performances.
The next day on Feb. 22, Readers Theatre and Short Film will be awarded their Outstanding Performer medals at the All-State Large Group Speech Festival in Ames at ISU. Short Film "One Last Night" will get the opportunity to perform at the festival and have a shot at getting the critic's choice banner. The writer of the short film was Bradley Nissen who also played the lead male role in the film. “I put a great amount of work into this film, but not nearly as much as James Thoelke [director and editor] did. I spent almost all of my Saturdays for a couple months working on it with everyone else,” said Nissen. The idea for the story sparked this summer for Nissen and thus began the collaboration with Thoelke.
This year the large group speech team consisted of: One-Act play "Any Body For Tea", Choral Reading "No Time To Wait", Readers Theatre "The Brothers Grimm Spectaculathon", two Radio Broadcasting "Grez 1.0 Million Grease Radio" and "The NITE 108.6", Ensemble Acting "Hickory, Dickory, What?", three Group Improvisation teams, two Short Films "Term Paper" and "One Last Night", and Group Mime "A Pirate’s Life For Me."
After tryouts and practice, all of these groups went to Districts at Perry where they competed with over 20 schools. All of the groups previously mentioned got to go to State, with the exception of Choral Reading and the two Radio Broadcastings. Senior Madelyn Christensen strongly believed that her Choral Reading group did wonderful, even with some minor problems, although she still thinks that they deserved to perform at State. Much controversy surrounded the division II rating and many choral reading students and audience members felt that the group was cheated out of a spot at State.
State Large Group Speech was held at Ankeny with all the schools in the south west region that earned a Division I rating at Districts. Seven out of the nine Audubon groups received Division I ratings at State, with two group improvs falling just a little short. Short Film "One Last Night" and Readers Theater then were nominated for the All-State Large Group Speech Festival. Readers Theatre got non-performing honors at All-State. Non-performing is where they were not ranked high enough to perform, but high enough to be honored. Austin Miller said, “I am disappointed that we don’t get to perform at All-State, but I’m glad to at least be there for non-performing.” An All-State Outstanding Performer Award is the highest honor a speech team member can receive.
Short Film will be performing at 3:10 in Ames on Saturday. But don’t forget to also come tonight and enjoy the Audubon Large Group Speech Team at Wintertainment.
The next day on Feb. 22, Readers Theatre and Short Film will be awarded their Outstanding Performer medals at the All-State Large Group Speech Festival in Ames at ISU. Short Film "One Last Night" will get the opportunity to perform at the festival and have a shot at getting the critic's choice banner. The writer of the short film was Bradley Nissen who also played the lead male role in the film. “I put a great amount of work into this film, but not nearly as much as James Thoelke [director and editor] did. I spent almost all of my Saturdays for a couple months working on it with everyone else,” said Nissen. The idea for the story sparked this summer for Nissen and thus began the collaboration with Thoelke.
This year the large group speech team consisted of: One-Act play "Any Body For Tea", Choral Reading "No Time To Wait", Readers Theatre "The Brothers Grimm Spectaculathon", two Radio Broadcasting "Grez 1.0 Million Grease Radio" and "The NITE 108.6", Ensemble Acting "Hickory, Dickory, What?", three Group Improvisation teams, two Short Films "Term Paper" and "One Last Night", and Group Mime "A Pirate’s Life For Me."
After tryouts and practice, all of these groups went to Districts at Perry where they competed with over 20 schools. All of the groups previously mentioned got to go to State, with the exception of Choral Reading and the two Radio Broadcastings. Senior Madelyn Christensen strongly believed that her Choral Reading group did wonderful, even with some minor problems, although she still thinks that they deserved to perform at State. Much controversy surrounded the division II rating and many choral reading students and audience members felt that the group was cheated out of a spot at State.
State Large Group Speech was held at Ankeny with all the schools in the south west region that earned a Division I rating at Districts. Seven out of the nine Audubon groups received Division I ratings at State, with two group improvs falling just a little short. Short Film "One Last Night" and Readers Theater then were nominated for the All-State Large Group Speech Festival. Readers Theatre got non-performing honors at All-State. Non-performing is where they were not ranked high enough to perform, but high enough to be honored. Austin Miller said, “I am disappointed that we don’t get to perform at All-State, but I’m glad to at least be there for non-performing.” An All-State Outstanding Performer Award is the highest honor a speech team member can receive.
Short Film will be performing at 3:10 in Ames on Saturday. But don’t forget to also come tonight and enjoy the Audubon Large Group Speech Team at Wintertainment.