Parkland Drama Students Surprise Another New York City Theater Audience

This time it was with a performance at a Shakespeare in the Park benefit.

Drama students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, where 17 people were shot dead in February, have again surprised an audience with a touching performance.

Unsuspecting theatergoers at a fundraiser in New York's Central Park for the summer Shakespeare in the Park program were treated to a special number Monday, just a day after they graced the stage at the Tony Awards.

Monday's benefit included a production of the 1978 Tony-nominated show "Runaways" by the late Elizabeth Swados, CBS News reports.

The Parkland students were brought onstage at the conclusion of the show. They performed a piece written by Swados for a "Runaways" screenplay that was never produced.

Hours earlier, the students appeared during Sunday's award show, where they sang "Seasons of Love" from the musical "Rent."

Their drama teacher, Melody Herzfeld, was honored during the show with a Tony Award for excellence in theater education.

Herzfeld has been credited with protecting her students during the Valentine's Day shooting.

She directed her students in a singing performance during a CNN town hall that took place just a week after a gunman went on a shooting rampage in the hallways of their school.

The performance of "Shine," a song written by two of her students, spoke volumes to the solidarity of the Parkland community, and the pain in the aftermath of the massacre.

She explained the chorus was made up of many of her drama students, and she helped encourage each of them to use their creativity to take action.

"I was so proud of my students," she said. "My job is not to tell them how to be, or what to believe, or how to think. My job is only to support what their truths are and be behind them as a teacher."

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