By Anna Grace Shaia

Beginning in 5th Grade, Collegiate girls eagerly wait each fall for the most exciting morning of the year: Brunch. As exciting as Brunch can be, it is a great deal of work for the junior girls, as they spend the fall semester preparing the entire show for all of the Middle and Upper School girls. 

Brunch has been a Collegiate tradition for over 50 years and has changed throughout the years. Brunch was originally an event and meal for all girls in grades 5th through 12th, where the girls would eat while they watched the junior girls perform the show on the stage in McFall Hall, which served a performance space before the Hershey Center for the Arts was built. As time went, on Brunch moved to Oates Theater, and the lunch changed from being for all of the girls to just the juniors and seniors having lunch together after the show. Brunch and Feast of Juul, the senior boys’ dinner, used to take place the last day before Winter Break in December. At the time, first semester exams took place in January. Over 10 years ago, exams were moved to December, so Brunch and Feast were moved up to right before Thanksgiving break, so that students could focus on exams in December. 

Now, Brunch has nothing to do with food and is a performance that the junior girls put on for the senior girls. While the performance is mainly for the senior girls, all of the Middle and Upper School girls still come to watch the show. The plot of Brunch always revolves around the senior girl’s gifts being stolen by a villain and the journey to save the senior girls gifts.  

Melanie Gorsline (‘74), an alumna and longtime Middle School art teacher, loves how Brunch “really brings your class together.” She also loves that Brunch connects so many different generations of Collegiate students. 

Junior girls have many responsibilities for Brunch, as they are involved in every aspect of the show. In the spring of their sophomore year, the rising junior girls start meeting together with the faculty sponsors in charge of Brunch to begin planning. The faculty sponsors, which this year included Upper School Spanish teacher Hannah Curley, Upper School French teacher Laurel Maughan, Upper School counselor Antenette Stokes, and theater production technician Ellie Wilder, spend countless hours assisting the junior girls and keeping them on task.

Each junior chooses a committee they want to be a part of to help prepare the “best Brunch ever.” There are usually 13 different committees for the girls to choose from, with a wide range of interests and varying amounts of commitment. Different committees include co-chairs, directors, songs, costumes, fake theme, props, theater decorations, publicity, programs, traditions, t-shirts, script, and dance. 

Vector in Brunch ’22.

After choosing a theme, which was based on the hit film Despicable Me this year, the committee in charge of writing the script begins. For the script, the goal is to make it creative and funny, incorporating modern day references and characters. 

It is a tradition to keep the theme for Brunch a major secret, and some girls even say that finding out the theme would “ruin Brunch.” However, the theme is not as important during the real show. The main characters from the chosen movie are the main characters in Brunch and use parts from the movie. The majority of the show consists of references from TikTok and other social media, other movies or shows, places around Richmond, our rival schools, like St. Christopher’s and St. Catherine’s, and other references related to Collegiate and the students. 

Once the script is made, auditions are held for characters, and girls are assigned dances based on requests.

Katie Cullen, (‘24), who played Vector in Brunch this year, said that “It was super duper fun being in multiple scenes and interacting with a ton of different characters.” Cullen was one of the main characters, and for younger girls, she suggests having a large role in Brunch. She explained that, “Sometimes I would get a little overwhelmed if I had a long practice and a big assignment the next day, but it never ever was awful.” 

Brunch practices began in late September after school and sports practices, starting with dance rehearsals. Once the cast was made and finalized, in late October a few scenes were assigned different nights to come to school to practice. Then, in November, there were three nights a week where specific scenes and dances would come in to practice everything all together. 

As Brunch began to get closer, practices and rehearsals became more serious and stressful. They started to include more scenes each week, and we began having practices on weekends, which lasted hours, while we still had school work to complete before Thanksgiving break. 

This can be a stressful time for junior girls, as teachers are cramming in last-minute tests, quizzes, and papers before Thanksgiving break. 

On the evening before Brunch, the junior girls stay after school and decorate Oates Theater with lights, garland, and tacky holiday themed decorations, in effort to make the theater look as festive as possible. After the theater is decked out, it is time for the dress rehearsal. Each junior gets to invite a certain number of people, and alumni are invited as well. After the dress rehearsal, the junior girls typically have a sleepover with all of the girls in their grade. The sleepover is a time for the junior girls to bond together before the final performance of Brunch, and they often end up staying awake all night long.

5th Grade girls performing “The 12 Days of Christmas” with the audience following along.

On the morning of Brunch, the junior girls have a dance party on the stage before the performance starts, trying to get all of the other girls excited. While this is happening, a few junior girls run through the hallways to bring in younger grades into the theater.

Once the senior girls arrive, the show begins. All of the stress and anxiety from preparing the show is gone, and all everyone cares about is making this Brunch the best Brunch possible for the senior girls.

Before the performance starts, the 5th Grade girls get on stage and perform “The 12 Days of Christmas” with hand motions that the entire crowd knows. All of the girls in the crowd are singing along and doing the hand motions with the 5th Graders. 

After the performance is over, all of the junior girls gather on the edge of the stage and sing “All I Want For Christmas Is You” by Mariah Carey and one other song chosen by the girls. After both songs are sung, the co-chairs read off  “Santa’s List” and dedicate a “gift” to each grade. The “gifts” are characters from the performance, with a sweet message for that grade. The traditions committee announces the Halo Girls, the girls in each grade who are the best at “displaying kindness and the core values of Collegiate,” as voted on by peers. Once everyone is excused, the senior and junior girls stay in the theater and take pictures together and watch a slide show that the junior girls created for the seniors. 

Sitting on the stage singing the final two songs of the show is a moment that I will never forget. Looking out at the first few rows filled with all of the senior girls and seeing them all together made all of the hard work put into Brunch really feel meaningful and worth it.

All photos by Taylor Dabney.