As December hits, it is time for an annual school tradition, Puttin’ on the Hitz (POTH). Every year senior planning hosts the talent show and comes up with a new theme. The theme of the show this year was seasons and took place on Thursday, Dec. 5.
With POTH being a student favorite, sports clubs as well as grade planners partake in the talent show. Each group that signs up creates a dance for their students and enters into the competition. This year those groups included SGA, K-pop, poms, Afroelites, National Honor Society, girls’ soccer, Bollywood club, boys’ soccer, and then all four grades class planning groups performed. The senior class planning routine is not entered into the competition since they are the ones who planned the show.
The show also featured a Balian Brother faceoff, where senior triplets Alex Balian, Will Balian and Charlie Balian had their own mini competition on stage, Students of all grade levels are encouraged to participate as a way to bring the school community together. “I thought POTH was a really fun event. It was very interactive and it was fun to do with all my friends,” sophomore Elena Firoozfar said.
Two mandatory dress rehearsals were held on Tuesday, Dec. 3, and Wednesday, Dec. 4. “It was for sure tiring and draining that on the second day of rehearsals there was a 40-minute break between the first and second run through,” Kholi said.
This year the judges were special education teacher Mia Krawczel and a capella teacher Keith Schwartz. Schwartz is also one of the two senior grade sponsors along with yoga teacher Victoria McCarthy. Along with the judges there was also a Google form used to pick winners. There were two different categories in the show and two winners. The first one was all of the clubs and the second one was all of the grade performances. Last year’s winners were boys’ soccer and the class of 2026 (current juniors). The winner for this year’s competition for the clubs was SGA and the grade winners were the sophomores (class of 2027). “My favorite moment of the night was SGA winning,” senior Yana Kholi said.
Alongside the judging panel, there are also four hosts throughout the night. For the first part of the show, senior class president Noah Friedman and senior Kyle Fuster hosted. After intermission seniors Marissa Cook and Melissa Lee replaced the boys and hosted the rest of the show. Aside from introducing the different acts the hosts also have other responsibilities that include engaging the crowd and keeping everyone entertained in between acts.
The hosts make jokes throughout the night and poke fun at one another in order to get the crowd to laugh. The girls incorporated some costume changes in between acts while Fuster and Friedman told a few jokes.“We introduced the acts and tried to incorporate humor to keep the audience engaged. My favorite part was changing outfits in between acts,” Lee said.
