TALENT SEARCH TALENT FOUND
BY MARY LANCASTER INDEPENDENT WRITER
Everybody will be a winner at this Saturday's Community Talent Show being held in the high school auditorium. Sponsored by the Nantucket Community School, the March 29 event called "Nantucket's Got Talent," begins at 2 p.m. and is expected to provide about two hours of entertainment from islanders of all ages, said NCS interim executive director Pauline Proch.

PHOTO BY CARY HAZLEGROVE Friends Virginia Bullington (left) and Annabell Gould will be belting out "I'm Not That Girl" from the Broadway show "Wicked" at the Nantucket's Got Talent event at the high school Saturday sponsored by the Nantucket Community School. The noncompetitive talent show does not name a winner or give prizes, but is to encourage people of all ages to share their abilities.

The first round of auditions was held on Saturday, March 15 with participants encouraged to perform music, short sketches, magic shows, poetry readings and dance, for example. The auditions were limited to three minutes and actual performances may not exceed four minutes. Another set of auditions will be held in the high school auditorium tomorrow, Thursday, March 27 from 3 to 5 p.m.

The idea behind the show is to encourage people to strut their stuff, so to speak, in front of fellow Nantucketers. Therefore, there are no judges, no ultimate winner and no prizes are awarded.

"We've got a lot of young children and young dance groups, some poetry and someone doing a character piece," said Proch. "Hopefully, we'll have a couple of bands playing. It's going to be quite a diverse group. I've found that children don't have a place to showcase their talent, so why not use the wonderful stage at the high school?"

Proch explained that in January the school staff knew they wanted to offer some type of fun, community winter event and then happened to discover a Community Talent program guide dated 1998. A little further investigating showed that the idea originated 13 years ago but lapsed for the last 10 years. Proch is pleased to be reinstituting the presentation.

"I hope this will generate interest and we can showcase future events. We knew we would attract young children as well as adults, so we didn't want to make it into a contest," said Proch. "We didn't want children getting up on stage for the first time and then having them be judged. This is to empower people to get up there and share what their talent is. They are all winners. This world is too full of achieving - they are all winners in my eyes for getting up and performing, and that's an achievement in itself."

So far, acts include Virginia Bullington and Annabell Gould singing "I'm Not That Girl," from the Broadway show "Wicked." Also featured will be Catherine, Mary and Adrian Goode with Emily Kitsock in a combination singing, dancing and comedy routine; Katie Ponce, who will sing; and Sophie Proch, Isabelle Roberts and KD Tornovish who will sing together.

Tickets will be sold at the door and are $8 for adults and $4 for children. Proceeds offset the cost of producing the show and NCS children's programs such as the elementary school's Arts and Discovery held after academic hours and towards new programs

planned for middle school students. I