The Newcastle productions of the full-length and shorter versions for young performers of the two Disney's High School musicals have drawn large audiences since a professional production of the first show was presented by Hunter Publishing at Newcastle Entertainment Centre in 2007.

The three performances sold out, with 4300 people seeing the show.

Half of the packed audience was aged 12 and under.

The excellence of the production was underlined when Anne Frost, who played its eccentric drama teacher, Ms Darbus, won that year's CONDA Award for best professional actress in a supporting role.

Productions since then by young people's theatre companies have also been popular.

Pantseat Performing Arts presented High School Musical Jr at the Civic Playhouse in 2016 and High School Musical 2 Jr in the following year.

And Bling Performing Arts staged the full-length High School Musical at Lake Macquarie Performing Arts Centre in 2018.

Australian Dance and Talent Centre is presenting High School Musical 2 Jr at the Civic Playhouse nightly from Thursday, September 5, to Saturday, September 7, at 7pm, plus a 2pm Saturday matinee. Ring 4929 1977 for tickets, (adult $38.50, and junior $22.50).

High School Musical 2 has most of the same characters as the first High School Musical, but the situations are very different.

The first musical has a boy, Troy, returning from a school holiday and finding that Gabriella, a girl he met and romanced while on an excursion with his parents, has become a student at the school as her parents have moved to the town. And while he and Gabriella begin a romance, Sharpay, a girl who wants to be his partner, tries hard to attract him.

The sharp-tongued Sharpay also tries to force her twin brother, Ryan, to assist her, telling him that as he's a few minutes younger than her he has to obey her orders. Much of the story is set against rehearsals for a school musical.

High School Musical 2 is set at the end of a school year, with many students getting holiday jobs at a country club owned by the father of Sharpay and Ryan.

Sharpay uses her father's ownership to try to make Troy woo her, knowing that Troy, who is a good basketball player, is using the job to help him get a basketball scholarship. And she is determined to have him romance her. The story also includes a talent quest staged at the club.

The production, directed by Drew Holmes, and with choreography by Tim Shaw and musical direction by Chiara Pantalero, has 26 actors aged 11-18.

Hannah Pandell, who plays Sharpay, sees her as very complicated and dramatic, and making things stressful for everyone. Jasper Coy, as Ryan, sees himself as realising that he has worth despite being treated as "second best" by his family.

Bill Parry, as Troy, notes that he's a nice guy and always doing things to help friends.

And Lillie Kerslake as Gabriella, points to her treating everyone, including Sharpay, as friends, even though Sharpay isn't nice to her.

SHAKESPEARE'S comedy, one of his first works, deals with an eternal subject - the relationships between men and women - so it's appropriate that this production has the characters wearing garb from recent decades.

The clothes also make comments about the people's natures.

Katherina, the "shrew" for example (played by Isabelle Moy), arrives for a wedding that she doesn't want to have very unsmiling, and wearing an elegant white wedding gown.

And when her prospective husband, Petruchio (James McCaffrey), comes late clad in untidy everyday work clothes, it's also clear that love isn't in his air.

The 15 actors, aged from mid-teens to late 20s, make this a very engaging show, with the situations and characters very timeless.

Katherina finds herself forced to marry because her wealthy and unsmiling father, Baptista (Alex Simpson), won't let his attractive younger daughter, Bianca (Victoria Bridge), wed before her older sister, even though she likes many of the men she meets and who would like to make her their bride.

The staging team, headed by director Joanne Lawler, have the audience laughing when unexpected things happen, and when things don't go right for members of both sexes.

One scene, for example, has 10 men seated at a dinner table and waiting for the two sisters and a married woman to arrive, with the women clearly having decided not to go there.

ACTOR-writer-director Peter Trist - renowned for his acted readings of new and interesting plays in the Lovett Gallery at Newcastle Library - will present there on Thursday, September 5 at 6pm Stevie, which looks at the life of English poet Stevie Smith, who escaped a dull middle class existence through her poetry.

The play, written in 1977 by Hugh Whitemore, looks at her relationships with the spinster "lion aunt" in whose house she lived, and men with whom she was involved in affairs, including one she was engaged to.

Her most famous poem, Not Waving But Drowning, arose from things that happened in her life.

The reading team includes Peter Trist, Janet Gillam, Jan Hunt, and David Ebert.

Note that the work includes interactions with audience members.