Laurels & lances: Musicals & mud

Laurel: To rising stars. On Saturday, the talent and hard work of 34 local schools was celebrated at the Benedum Center with the annual Gene Kelly Awards.

It is the oldest regional high school theater awards event in America. It began in 1991 and is named after the Pittsburgh native who enchanted audiences in the splashiest Hollywood musicals like “An American in Paris,” “Singin’ in the Rain” and “Brigadoon.”

This year, Kelly wasn’t the only late influence being honored. It was the first award event since the death of Charlie Gray, the former executive director of the Pittsburgh CLO and creative force behind the awards.

But as Gray envisioned, it was a celebration of the future of theater arts, with 2,663 students participating in the productions and more than $70,000 in scholarships awarded.

Kelly is just one of the stars to rise out of the region. The Gene Kelly Awards event shows the small stages of local schools are still producing names that could end up in lights.

Lance: To sinking grief. Losing a loved one is hard. Sometimes the only thing that helps cope is the ability to visit a resting place and feel close again.

Sola Samuels, and others, are denied that.

Samuels’ mother, brother and grandmother are among those buried in a particular section of Mt. Airy Cemetery in Harrison. The cemetery was established in 1917. It has 85 acres — and one section, near the back and framed by pine trees and a fence, is flooded. It affects about 40 graves.

It has been a problem for years. Mt. Airy owner Everstory Partners has made efforts to fix it since at least 2019, when a French drain was installed. It helped a little but still left standing water after bad weather came through. The area has been regraded at least twice since then.

“We should see whether these recent adjustments improve drainage after any storm events in the near term,” said Everstory’s Michele Stone, who called the situation “important and impactful.”

TribLive visited the affected area with Samuels. It is a gooey mud pit surrounded by caution tape. Headstones have been removed and small cards on stakes mark grave sites. Samuels isn’t wrong when she calls it a “soupy mess.”

This isn’t a “wait and see” situation. If the ground can’t be fixed — and maybe it can’t — then another solution needs to be found. It is cruel to leave mourning families to visit their loved ones at a distance in a swamp.