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All-State performers show off their talent

  • Students John Perez, Gavin Connell and Chris Campbell, seniors, at the IHSSA All-State competition in Ames. They participated in group improvisation. Contributed photo.

  • Students Emily and Lily Woodard, sophomores, at the IHSSA Group All-State Festival in Ames. They participated in group improvisation. Contributed photo.

By Thomas Nelson, tnelson@charlescitypress.com

Despite having a coach stuck in an elevator, two Charles City speech improv groups performed at the All-State Group Speech Festival at the Iowa State Center in Ames this past weekend.

The festival isn’t a competition as much as it is a chance for the best performers and performances to be shown off.

Students Emily and Lily Woodard, sophomores; and John Perez, Gavin Connell and Chris Campbell, seniors; performed in the group improvisation category among the northeast Iowa district representatives.

“The Woodard twins, Emily and Lily, they’re a lot of fun,” said speech coach Mike Lembke. The twins do a “Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye combo,” he said.

“Emily’s always the straight man and Lily’s always doing all these outrageous characters, one after the other,” Lembke said. “They even had fun hanging a lantern on the fact that they were twins for their All-State performance.”

One asked the other, “Have I found true love?” and the other replied “No, you’re too ugly,” Lembke said.

The three boys all did fantastically, Lembke said.

“They have a tendency to be very very physical, throwing people around,” Lembke said. “What they did at state was hysterical.”

At the district level of the Iowa High School Speech Association (IHSSA) there were 750 groups of performers, but only 25 or so from each district perform at All-State, Lembke said.

“It is a major honor to be chosen,” he said.

Both Charles City groups were nominated by judges at the Feb. 3 state competition to perform at the All-State Festival.

During the festival, Lembke was caught in an elevator but made good use of his time by writing.

“Just narrating what was going,” Lembke said. “I could hear stuff and I could feel it bounce because of the elevator right next to me.”

After the 2018 event, Charles City will have had performing or non-performing student groups represented for more than 35 years in a row at IHSSA All-State.

After the event, a participant banner is purchased by the team.

“I think we’re going to start hanging them up,” Lembke said, “just like they do in sports.”

All of the participating speech students made it to the state competition this year.

“I’m really proud of all the kids,” Lembke said. “This is two years in a row that we took every student to state.”

“All-State is just icing on the cake,” he said. “We try to be prepared for All-State at state.”

Now that group speech season is over the students are getting ready for individual competitions beginning this coming weekend.

“In individual speech, you get a chance to teach something that they would use for the rest of their lives — standing up and giving a speech in front of a crowd,” Lembke said.

IHSSA offers a variety of  competitions, including mime and musical theater.

“It is much more of a growing experience,” Lembke said. “The kids aren’t going to necessarily use stage-right and stage-left the rest of their life.”

The students all attend the All-State Festival regardless of whether they perform, as an educational event.

The district individual speech competition will be Saturday, Feb. 24, in Riceville.

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