Happy Hanukkah!
Good news for everyone: my sister is finally done with her semi-remote semester, and that means we’re finally making a dent on our long list of holiday specials. This year has been really rough, so I’ll only write about the ones that made me smile. First up: High School Musical : The Musical: The Holiday Special, or the redhead Jewish representation I’ve been craving my whole life.
Yup, it has musical in the title twice. Courtesy: IMDB
This 45 minute musical revue on Disney+ is not just for fans of the show (which, by the way, is a bucket of student theater nostalgia and addictively fun). Each major cast member returns with a sweet holiday song, but they appear as themselves, not the characters they play, so we get a window into their lives and personalities before the series that made them famous. It’s not a sequel or a transition to the next season, but a through and through holiday special that does not scream PANDEMIC and will likely stand the test of time.
Fellow tweens-at-heart who’ve acquired a taste for Disney channel’s after-school content will revel in the shiny, saturated shots, dances meant for bopping along, and neutral wholesome content. Fellow ABC connoisseurs might recognize many of the sets (hint: what overdramatic venue was already under contract?) and wonder who managed to convince Disney that celebrating queer relationships isn’t a dangerous thing after all. Memories, home videos, and cast gossip provide breaks between the holiday music. And as always, Joshua Bassett wrote something sweet and simple, and Olivia Rodrigo hits you deep with a moody singer-songwriter ballad.
But let’s be honest — the Jews really light up this holiday show.
Julia Lester rocking it out. Do kindly note the socks. Courtesy: IMDB
A wash of blue and silver introduces Julia Lester, who plays the spunky songwriter Ashlyn Caswell in HSMTMTS. She reflects on the wide variety of Christmas songs she’s learned over the years, but in honor of the Festival of Lights, she’s here to bring us a pop medley of Hanukkah’s greatest hits. Her red hair glows in candle-like lighting and a flash of silvery costume changes. As the tints of blue fade back to red, I’m thinking, alright, we had our token Jewish song. And that’s okay! Maybe if we are lucky, we’ll get a non-denominational winter melody at the end.
Enter Larry Saperstein. In the series, he’s the mild and beloved stage crew member Big Red. In the holiday special, he is his full tap-dancing self, and remarkably transparent about his struggles as a lone Jewish kid navigating a season drenched in Santa Claus. My heart broke a little bit when he admits he used to wish for a Christmas present each year, because he wasn’t sure how it all worked house to house. By honoring another Jewish man, Irving Berlin, with a classic rendition of “White Christmas," Saperstein emphasizes how grateful he is to be a member of the tribe. Also, yeah, he is a redhead, so maybe I’m a little biased. But it’s my corner here, and I can gush about Jewish redheads if I want to (there are so few of us!).
This family-friendly, bite-sized special pairs well with quarantine baking and daydreaming of a less complicated existence. Are you planning to watch the second season?