I had an incredibly random but relevant memory the other day, and I thought that you guys would like to hear about it!

In 2000 (I was in 8th grade at the time), I went to Moreland Ridge Middle School, which is one of the feeder middle schools for Blue Springs South High School. That fall, South was doing Taming of the Shrew for their fall play, and it was touring to the middle schools, performing scenes and talking about the BSSHS drama department.

So Mrs Cooper starts talking about how drama works, and then they performed a scene. For those of you that haven't seen Taming of the Shrew, it's about two sisters and two men. One man loves the younger sister, Bianca, but she can't get married until her older sister gets married - and her older sister is reputed to be the meanest and nastiest woman in town. So a stranger named Petruchio moves in, and the lover asks him to woo the mean older sister. He does it.

The scene they performed was a classic scene for a Shakespearian fight - basically Petruchio and Katherine (the older sister) get into a fight in the town square. It's full of insults and barbs and slapstick, but the thing I remember most is this.

At one point, Katherine snaps something about stinging Petruchio, and he retorts "and where does a bee keep its sting?"

The way BSSHS staged it was Petruchio was supposed to bend her over his knee and slap her on the rear.

SO! Imagine, if you will, a gym full of 8th-graders watching David Cook bend his costar over his knee and give her a rude slap. All the while wearing classic 16th-century costumes and using Ye Olde Englishe.

That must have been a Kodak moment. Having a picture of that would be priceless.

Unfortunately, I had no way of knowing he'd be famous in eight years at the time, else I would have. Back then he was just "lol Andrew's older brother"

Was he a good actor ?

Very yes

That's REALLY cool. Haha. Pretty wild.
So you went to school with Andrew?

No wonder he's so comfortable doing lines and being in front of people. That Shakespeare is a booger to do.
Yeah, I'm up for a DC movie. 2 hours of him on a BIG screen and his music as the soundtrack......BONANZA!!!

That's hysterical! I wish we had some video.



That's so cute, cause now Andrew is known as "David Cook's [awesome] little brother!"

Oh man! I would absolutely die! A DC movie would be amazing. we should all convince him to do it after he does his solo tour.

LOL the taming of the shrew! that's hilarious! I can only imagine what that looked like, him in his spiffy clothes speaking Shakespeare! LOL you just made my day!

That's too funny.

I remember my high school performed Taming of the Shrew. The story line is pretty much the same as "10 Things I Hate About You" starring Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger.

I did. We were actually improv partners in 8th grade... didn't do so well at tournaments but oh well.



"10 Things I hate About You" is an adaptation of "Taming of the Shrew," down to character names and events.

You can only imagine how learning that David was in a Shakespeare production makes this English Nerd very happy. =)

Thanks for sharing! I LOVE Shakespeare, so I really enjoyed this story!

Hey guys...I'm new here, but I've lurked here for a while and I've seen this thread before...

Guess what came in my GoogleAlerts today? A link to a Blue Springs newspaper, The Examiner...with a photo gallery I've never seen before.

Lo and behold...


Their caption: "David Cook plays the guitar off stage while waiting to perform his role of Petruchio during a production of 'The Taming of the Shrew' during his senior year."

I was pretty sure I'd never seen this pic on here before...I posted it in the Picture thread too.

Haha great find! Just the fact that David and Heath Ledger played the same part at one point makes me soo happy, lol. I love 'em both!