Every April, Steinert hosts Mr. SHS, a comedic event often referred to as a “male beauty pageant” where the winner receives a free prom ticket. One male is nominated by each club that chooses to participate in the event, hence why they are referred to by their clubs. For example, I was chosen to represent the robotics team and was referred to as Mr. Robotics. After each club sends in their representative to Mrs. Caruso, the fun begins. 

At the beginning of Mr. SHS, a funny 8-10 minute video is played, building up to the contestants’ run through the isles onto the stage. What does this video consist of though? Typically, each year, the video showcases the contestants participating in a skit or series of skits doing something stupid or comically amusing. That still begs the question: what exactly will each year’s video be? The candidates for Mr. SHS brainstorm several skit ideas along with Mrs. Caruso and members of the SGA. Meanwhile, contestants had to also learn and practice the dance they perform at the beginning of the show. 

This year, we rehearsed the dance for some time before focusing our energy onto the video. By the time we actually began to work on the video, we had a list of about thirteen different skit ideas. We narrowed this list down to the four skits that you saw at the start of Mr. SHS. You might be interested to know that some of the ideas that didn’t make the cut included references to Breaking Bad, Stranger Things, and even TikTok. 

After we finally knew what our video was going to have, we brought in Mr. D’Elia to record the video. A few hours later, our video was done. Well, actually not quite. Mr. D’Elia still had to edit the video. Thank you Mr. D’Elia! With the video out of the way, we had three weeks left before the show to finalize and practice our talents, which should’ve been mostly finished seeing that a month had passed by then. The week before Mr. SHS was when we started performing our mostly-finished talents on-stage during rehearsals. Being the procrastinator that I am, that was also the week I began working on mine. Of course, I created the Google Doc for my interview with the robot two hours before our run-through and only finished it in the middle of the practice run by forcing Mr. Choir to perform his talent before me. Even then, the script wasn’t finalized. The part where the robot attacked Mr. Sinkleris wasn’t added until three days before the show!

When April 27 finally arrived, the other contestants and I made a list of all the judges: Mrs. DeBonis, Mr. Sinkleris, Mr. Wheeler, Mr. Caruso, Mrs. Melker, Ms. Laird. Although Mr. Caruso tells us that “bribes don’t work” or whatever, we all know they do. Probably. After school, the first thing I did was go to ShopRite and buy a couple bribes. At 5:45 that evening, all the other contestants and I arrived jittery and anxious in Mr. Sinkleris’s room. We changed into our outfits, lent to us by Princeton Tuxedo, and gave ourselves a few pep talks. Once the lights flickered and the video began, we huddled around the auditorium doors, waiting for our cue. From here, the show ran mostly as expected. Mr. Spartones was voted and won Mr. Congeniality for being the friendliest. Mr. Wrestling won Mr. Runner-Up and Mr. Legs for raising the most money with a picture of his leg. This brings us to Mr. Marching Unit who won Mr. SHS!

I should note that after the contestants dance, they are introduced and walk on stage. Being the nerd that I am, I decided to play with electricity and short a battery during my introduction. However, I did not expect the battery I used during my demonstration to be as charged as it was and almost triggered the fire alarms and smoke detectors while Mrs. Caruso was frantically fanning away at the smoke. Oops. If you are interested in participating in Mr. SHS when you become a senior, I hope this gave you somewhat of an idea of what it’s like behind the scenes.