“I keep the pee off the streets and the water in the ground!” comes the yell of a man named Caldwell B. Caldwell.

It’s the absurdity of the musical Urinetown that makes it special. At first glance, the name alone spurs confusion. “I was not a fan at all. I absolutely judged the book (show? musical?) by its cover,” said Costume Director Vanessa Encarnacion ’25. 

“It was a unique theme for our last production, to say the least,” said Kathy Le ’25, a member of the Props Crew.

But what is Urinetown? The show dives into our world in a distant future, a world where you had to pay to pee. The fictional decades-long drought led to the enforcement of water conservation and, most notoriously, the inaccessible lofty price for a private toilet. Citizens are forced to pee at public amenities owned by the titan Urine Good Company (UGC), helmed by Caldwell B. Cladwell (Flaviano Garcia ’25).

The first act introduces a scrappy cast of characters, including Little Sally (Mia Golant ’27), the young girl seeking coins to pee, and Penelope Pennywise (Yardena Franklin ’25), the enforcer of the fees at the amenity. The second act, however, puts the rich more at odds with the disgruntled poor. A young idealist by the name of Bobby Strong (Elisa Oh ’26) at Public Amenity #9 seeks to change the status quo of the corrupt company, through a rebellious uprising. 

With a serious subject matter like class divisions and the potential of capitalist consumption, at its core, Urinetown still thrives on satire. It’s a musical that makes fun of itself and the musical genre as a whole. For one, the show is riddled with fourth-wall breaks from the narrator. “Sometimes– in a musical– it’s better to focus on one big thing rather than a lot of little things. The audience tends to be much happier that way. And it’s easier to write,” quips Officer Lockstock (Matteo Iraldo ’26), the musical’s tongue-in-cheek narrator, to the audience. 

After the success of Bronx Science’s previous musical, Mean Girls, there were concerns about how this production, with its relatively niche audience and unappealing name, would fare.

The journey for the cast and crew began with Biology teacher and Spring Musical Faculty Director Dr. Emily Schmidt’s cryptic Instagram emoji hints. First, she dropped a bunny emoji. Then money, followed by a cop, a yellow heart, and finally, a toilet. “I realized we were doing Urinetown when Dr. Schmidt posted the toilet,” said Lara Adamjee ’25, the show’s lighting director.

Indeed, soon after the emojis came the auditions. “It was a little overwhelming and very nerve-wracking walking into the silent room and collecting my thoughts to perform in front of a waiting audience,” said Krisha Soni ’25. Yet, auditions for the Spring Musical with Bronx Science’s Drama Department don’t have to make on anxious. As someone in the room for each audition, my favorite part of the process isn’t actually in the audition room itself—it’s walking into the hallway outside of it.

I’m always greeted with a sea of hopeful cast members, many of them hoping for the same select few handful of roles. Most of them came earlier than their audition time. Yet, as I call the next person into the audition room, there’s a different chorus of voices than the songs people typically sing–a chorus of support. I hear the chimes of “Go get them!” or “Good luck!” from everyone—even from people who just met—as every student who is auditioning walks into the room. “Looking back, I’m glad that I was able to have that opportunity to perform under pressure, even if I wasn’t very glad in the moment,” said Soni. “I met some incredible people even when I was just waiting for my turn, and it helped me to tackle my stage fright.”

Urinetown thrives on striking a balance between exploring the themes of political corruption and making fun of futile attempts to solve global issues. The cast and crew were up to the challenge. 

Still, we haven’t figured out the essential question—what is Urinetown? 

“It’s a kind of mythical place, you understand. A bad place…well, let’s just say it’s filled with symbolism and things like that,” offers corrupt policeman Officer Lockstock in the first song of the musical. As humorous as the line is, it’s also vague. With the curiosity of the audience still brewing, what else could Urinetown mean?

Soon after such a warning from Lockstock, the audience is given a look into how to get to Urinetown.  There are lights leading up to a grimy sea of public toilets. The toilets are implied, with the paint crew putting together a web of outdoor plumbing.

Eventually, Old Man Strong (Isaac Lamptey ’26) gets carted off to Urinetown after a stint of publicly urinating, caused by his lack of money to pay the fee.

“Urinetown is scarily relevant for being the ‘haha, pee musical!’ With a touch of satire, it tackles extreme corporate greed, political corruption, and overly violent outbursts from the people in response—all topics that are unfortunately applicable now more than ever,”  said Elisa Oh ’26, “In a way, it’s cathartic to be able to performatively channel emotions sparked by current events,”

Cladwell’s naive daughter and Bobby’s love interest, Hope, also plays an integral part in the musical. She’s the balance between two worlds of rebellion and order. “Hope is an interesting character for me to play as this role is the first time that I have had to portray such a significant shift in character. Hope goes from being a naive young girl to the leader of the new age,” said Ali Ribadeneria ’25, who played Hope. 

Before such fervent leadership, however, we need to meet the man who owns it all. Mr. Cladwell. ‘Mr. Cladwell,’ conveniently, is also the title of a song in the show. It’s this song where the choreography gets the most intricate. The cast floats around legal pads while performing tricky domino effects, singing the praises of the corrupt Cladwell, all while performing a 30-person long kickline. “It was probably the highlight of the show,” said Soni.

Technically, an office for all this chaos seems generic enough. Fancy desk. Fancy machines. What could be so hard? Under the surface, it was actually one of the crew’s greatest challenges. Collaboration is a theme among the crew. With one stage to tell the story, creativity is a necessity, and nowhere is it exhibited better than through the UGC sign. 

“Paint [crew] wrote the outline of UGC on pieces of wood and then Kai, a member of lights crew, took the wood pieces home so they could drill holes with their dad for light bulbs to go through,” said Lights Director Adamjee. “Then, Fiona, art director, and I screwed in spare light bulbs that Kai’s dad had provided and helped Mr. Collins hang the sign off the set. The project was super fun, and I think the sign ended up looking really good.”

One challenge is that the Bronx Science Drama Department doesn’t always get the funding it needs to put on a production this grand. To take a peek behind the curtain,  and oftentimes, the magic of a prop piece is accomplished by recycling. The fax machine in Urinetown was repurposed from the copy machine from last year’s Mean Girls. “T machine lacked sufficient means to stand upright long before we were to affix the appropriate keys and trays,” admitted props crew member Kathy Le ’25, “We spent a week’s worth of meetings constructing cardboard support. Come rehearsal, the supports began deteriorating during stage setting. The lack of black and white paint at the time restricted our instruments of repair to the dwindling sticks of hot glue and non-sticky clear tape.”

At this point, you may be thinking, what kind of a show is this? After all, 40-person kicklines and hot glue being used for structural prowess aren’t typical of every high school production. “Sometimes—in a musical—it’s better to focus on one big thing rather than a lot of little things. The audience tends to be much happier this way. And it’s easier to write,” said Officer Lockstock to Little Sally about her similar (albeit less specific) confusions about the show.

So let’s focus on the big stuff, shall we?

Soon after Cladwell’s victorious introduction is a cast-favorite song, ‘Cop Song.’ Focused on long sequences of rap from Officer Lockstock and sidekick Officer Barrel (Otter Maloney ’25), this song features the two cops detailing the pee-related deaths of past townsfolk on their journey to Urinetown. 

“My favorite song to learn and to perform is probably ‘Cop Song,’ just because it’s really fun and ironic. I love singing it, and the round is really fun!” said cast member Murphy Slater ’25.

“I’m not in it, but visually, ‘Cop Song’ looks incredible ], and it was so much fun to learn! It’s just contagiously catchy, plain and simple, and those of us in the cast find ourselves singing it even during breaks,” noted Elisa Oh ’25. Some standout lines include those about Urinetown victim Jacob Rosenbloom (“Didn’t know the jars he kept up there would obligate a trip to Urine Tomb”) and Roger Roosevelt (“Kept a cup below his belt, cup ran over when he knelt.”)

Nonetheless, the song’s messaging reflects the commentary of the show, innocent people getting hurt in the hands of the elite—a fact that the cast and crew took into account in their craft.

Right after ‘Cop Song’ is a stark tone shift. One of the warnings and tales of despair turns into a love-at-first-sight kind of story. 

“My favorite musical number to learn was ‘Follow Your Heart’…The fact that such a seemingly minuscule moment between two individuals is the catalyst for a rebellion that leaves both said people dead by the end of the show is very interesting to me. It demonstrates the blinding effect that love can have on you when you’re young,” said Ribadeneria.

Tender moments lead to leading a rebellion, at least in the eyes of Bobby Strong.

The end of Act 1 results in a cacophony of groups expressing their own kinda of disgruntlement. Whether it’s Bobby and The Poors’ breakout plea against UGC or Hope’s pleas against such violence, what better way to express feelings with a song and dance? “As a comedic tribute to classical Broadway, Urinetown is far more musically complex than past [Bronx Science] productions—nailing down layers and layers of harmony and counter-melodies was a challenge for sure,” said Oh. The aptly titled ‘Act 1 Finale’ embodied this struggle. “We made eleven protest signs featuring urine-related slogans that the cast and crew again contributed to,” said Le, “Our crowd-pleaser was Katelyn To’s ‘We resist amidst the piss.’”

Doom still looms beyond the great hill, however. What is Urinetown if not chaos? But we’re not done yet. As Officer Lockstock proclaims at the end of Act 1, the spark of rebellion can have people “thrown into confusion.” 

Underneath the rebellion is the crew that makes it look like an authentic (only potentially disastrous) rebellion. The show takes a turn in Act 2 and refocuses on the broader impact of the poor.

When you think of a community plagued by a water shortage, your first question may be how the logistics might play out.

To the team in costumes, the question is, how do we make these Bronx Science high schoolers look like the oppressed poor citizens rioting in a secret hideout? Unlike in past years, this show involved even more collaboration between the costume crew and cast. “I’d say it made the costuming process a lot more personal than the previous years, where we’d supply everything they had to wear,” said Encarnacion.

Act 2’s slight tone shift allowed the cast and crew to more deeply tackle the show’s broader themes. “stark commentary on capitalism and turning the other cheek whether that be for one’s own personal greed or for the righteous desire to do the “right thing.”

In the end, Cladwell attempts to bribe Bobby to stop the rebellion, attempting to leverage Bobby’s sense of greed. After Bobby’s refusal, Lockstock and Barrel kill Bobby by throwing him off a roof, effectively sending him to the real ‘Urinetown’–death. With Bobby’s newfound status as a martyr, Hope tries (and fails). But is that all that Urinetown is? A symbol for the a failed, poorly organized revolt? “Beyond the absurdity of Urinetown, the ending really forces you to reckon with yourself. If there’s something wrong in the world right now, would you fight it, even if the future may not be certain?” said Soni. 

Urinetown, the place, may reveal the abysmal nature of the world. Still, the impact of Urinetown, the musical, tells a different story. 

“I will miss the community of Urinetown. Theater is an extremely welcoming environment with wonderfully talented individuals.  We are always there to support each other’s artistic endeavors,” said Le.

“[Stage Crew] is a group of people bound together by show tunes and hot glue, and I can only hope that I find that in future productions I work on,” said Encarnacion.

Urinetown itself is an underdog story. While the story may have gone askew from Bobby’s vision, the cast and crew took it in stride and created a show consumed with grit. And, the same sense of pride can be directed toward musical theater at Bronx Science as a whole. 

“Whether it was through learning my first duet or acting through some of the primary turning points in the show, it has been such an amazing experience working in Bronx Science’s Drama Department throughout the years,” said Ribedeneria. 

“I love everyone I’ve worked with so much,” added Slater. 

I had the privilege of being the production stage manager. As the stage manager, I got to watch from the inside as the cast and crew worked toward something bigger than the sum of their props and cues. Tech weeks ran into the night. Blocking changed day to day. Costumes got adjusted and re-adjusted. But slowly, the world of Urinetown emerged—strange, but a grand result of utter commitment. 

Urinetown is a show made to highlight humility, and that was what Bronx Science’s Spring Musical was built upon. As Officer Lockstock and company utter, hands slowly raising even after death, in the final line of Urinetown, “That was our show!” So, despite the cynicism of a show like this, we hope you enjoyed it. We sure loved making it. 

“Beyond the absurdity of Urinetown, the ending really forces you to reckon with yourself. If there’s something wrong in the world right now, would you fight it, even if the future may not be certain?” said Krisha Soni ’25.