Concerned much more with the optics of tragedy, The Drummer Boy teeters between the senseless and heartbreaking like a vicious doom-scroll. It's a show swathed in satirical rage: one where halls are trenches, teachers are drill sergeants, and gunshots are timed to cheery dance breaks. Drug trips turn to hymns, and as soon as you turn a corner you're trapped bleeding in a broom closet with a phone to your face. Layered and stirring, Corona's musical stays with you long after the curtain drops.

The fact that there are so many plays about school shootings is a heartbreaking fact for our society but Jarred has taken this emotionally charged topic and explored it brilliantly. As an audience member you are privileged to a play that offers a multitude of perspectives surrounding this horrific tragedy, something which I feel is always important. You wouldn't normally think school shootings and musicals belong together but Jarred has taken a hard hitting issue and interlaced it with characters you feel for who proceed through this rollar coaster, taking the audience with them. Beautifully constructed! Thank you!

Highly original score. Entirely and horrifyingly still topical. For me, the line: "There were screams and gunshots. I swear they started harmonizing" captures the raw, lyrical, smart and fresh, layered play that it is. Bravo Jarred Corona.