Theater, Dance and Performance Studies’ ‘Newsflash! A Mini Musical’ channels graduation anxieties
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Last Updated May 7, 2021
It’s appropriate that “Newsflash! A Mini Musical” is virtually premiering in May, because its subjects collegiate high achievers who are now desperately scrambling to succeed in the real world will likely resonate with a portion of this year’s senior class of UC Berkeley undergraduates. Written by Eleanor Hammond and Emily Beihold, “Newsflash!” dramatizes the brutality of post-grad job hunting, using its brief runtime to move towards a more humane mentality for its three protagonists.
“Newsflash!” opens in the newsroom of the fictional New York Daily a setting conveyed by the main characters’ virtual Zoom backgrounds, of course on the morning of Ada (Kasia Baranek), Devon (Camilla Leonard) and Francesca’s (Arlyss Hays) interviews for the paper’s prestigious, competitive (and unpaid) internship. Devon and Franc