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Authors: Mindy Schneider
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Bat Mitzvahs, but thanks to my familyâs dual citizenship, mine had taken place a few months before coming to Kin-A-Hurra, shortly after I turned thirteen. I wasnât thrilled about singing solo, but luckily, a Bat Mitzvah isnât like a Broadway show. The range of musical notes is limited as are the audienceâs expectations. The rabbi was kind enough to tape record the event and hand me the cassettes afterward. To this day I have not had the nerve to listen to myself, but I must have done all right since the invited guests handed me envelopes with checks at the luncheon following the service.
So far no one at Kin-A-Hurra had heard me sing and I intended to keep it that way. âThe sound of musicâ was not likely to be the result of anything emerging from me. I thought about not auditioning at all, but Kenny was planning on being in the play and I couldnât risk losing a chance to be around him. It was time to go to Boysâ Side and try out for a new role.
There were too many of us to fit into the Valiant. Because we were the camp without a school bus, we climbed aboard its substitute, the Green Truck. Built in the dustbowl of the 1930s and intended for moving cattle, the Green Truck had open, slatted sides and a rickety metal roof. Iâd seen it for the first time when a load of boys showed up to âborrowâ our softball field to stage an egg fight, then left without cleaning up. Dana caught me staring in disbelief as the truckâs back gates swung open and people piled out, and she leaned over and whispered in my ear, âWe think Saul bought it on sale after the Holocaust.â
Once inside, I learned that the truck possessed a hard wooden floor and no shock absorbers, so the slightest bump in the road could send you flying. All the Dramamine in the world wouldnât have been enough for my brother Jay to last a fifty-foot journey.The rear gates had a tendency to come unlocked and swing open in the middle of traffic, so Maddy and the other bunkâs counselor stood at the back and held them shut.
Fourteen-year-old Mindy Plotke leaned over to me and said, âCan you believe this thing? The Joad family wouldnât be caught dead in this.â I smiled and nodded and pretended to understand the literary reference, though it would be another three years before Iâd be assigned to read
The Grapes of Wrath
. While Saul had warned me there would be a âcartload of Mindysâ at camp, pretty, petite Mindy Plotke and I were currently the only ones. Since she was a returning camper and I was new, she was known as Mindy and I was Other Mindy.
Kin-A-Hurra theater director Rhonda Shafter was a former Broadway star whoâd made quite a splash in a show called
Fresh Faces of 1929
. Her deep, bellowing voice had kept her out of Hollywoodâs new talking pictures, but she sang and danced for many years on the Great White Way and now found it her duty to nurture the next generation of stars. Rhonda was more than sixty years old and more than sixty pounds overweight. In spite of this and her three-pack-a-day Lucky Strikes habit, she danced with grace and, clad in one of her signature caftans, huffed and puffed as she tried to explain the difference between upstage and down-stage and why âstage rightâ meant left.
Surprisingly, Dana was not a shoo-in for the lead. With the fourteen-year-olds auditioning as well, there were several girls who could pull off
Do-Re-Mi
. Dana, who took private voice lessons in Manhattan, narrowly did capture the role and I wasnât entirely jealous. As the daughter of an Orthodox Jew, I wasnât sure how my father would feel about me cavorting on stage in a nunâs habit. The role of Liesl, the beautiful girl who sings
Sixteen Going on Seventeen
was the one I secretly coveted. I fantasized all the time about being a beautiful sixteen-year-old. That was the age at which my parents had promised I could get a nose job.
There
So far no one at Kin-A-Hurra had heard me sing and I intended to keep it that way. âThe sound of musicâ was not likely to be the result of anything emerging from me. I thought about not auditioning at all, but Kenny was planning on being in the play and I couldnât risk losing a chance to be around him. It was time to go to Boysâ Side and try out for a new role.
There were too many of us to fit into the Valiant. Because we were the camp without a school bus, we climbed aboard its substitute, the Green Truck. Built in the dustbowl of the 1930s and intended for moving cattle, the Green Truck had open, slatted sides and a rickety metal roof. Iâd seen it for the first time when a load of boys showed up to âborrowâ our softball field to stage an egg fight, then left without cleaning up. Dana caught me staring in disbelief as the truckâs back gates swung open and people piled out, and she leaned over and whispered in my ear, âWe think Saul bought it on sale after the Holocaust.â
Once inside, I learned that the truck possessed a hard wooden floor and no shock absorbers, so the slightest bump in the road could send you flying. All the Dramamine in the world wouldnât have been enough for my brother Jay to last a fifty-foot journey.The rear gates had a tendency to come unlocked and swing open in the middle of traffic, so Maddy and the other bunkâs counselor stood at the back and held them shut.
Fourteen-year-old Mindy Plotke leaned over to me and said, âCan you believe this thing? The Joad family wouldnât be caught dead in this.â I smiled and nodded and pretended to understand the literary reference, though it would be another three years before Iâd be assigned to read
The Grapes of Wrath
. While Saul had warned me there would be a âcartload of Mindysâ at camp, pretty, petite Mindy Plotke and I were currently the only ones. Since she was a returning camper and I was new, she was known as Mindy and I was Other Mindy.
Kin-A-Hurra theater director Rhonda Shafter was a former Broadway star whoâd made quite a splash in a show called
Fresh Faces of 1929
. Her deep, bellowing voice had kept her out of Hollywoodâs new talking pictures, but she sang and danced for many years on the Great White Way and now found it her duty to nurture the next generation of stars. Rhonda was more than sixty years old and more than sixty pounds overweight. In spite of this and her three-pack-a-day Lucky Strikes habit, she danced with grace and, clad in one of her signature caftans, huffed and puffed as she tried to explain the difference between upstage and down-stage and why âstage rightâ meant left.
Surprisingly, Dana was not a shoo-in for the lead. With the fourteen-year-olds auditioning as well, there were several girls who could pull off
Do-Re-Mi
. Dana, who took private voice lessons in Manhattan, narrowly did capture the role and I wasnât entirely jealous. As the daughter of an Orthodox Jew, I wasnât sure how my father would feel about me cavorting on stage in a nunâs habit. The role of Liesl, the beautiful girl who sings
Sixteen Going on Seventeen
was the one I secretly coveted. I fantasized all the time about being a beautiful sixteen-year-old. That was the age at which my parents had promised I could get a nose job.
There
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