High School Musical 2: A Camp Analysis
High School Musical 2, directed by Kenny Ortega, is often compared to Grease and Beach Party as a lowbrow teen romance film. Camp objects cannot be good and are thus considered Bad Objects, a violation of good taste in the media. However, Bad Objects can be so bad that they’re good or guilty pleasures. The theory of camp helps explain the cultural status of Bad Objects, such as High School Musical 2, as the Disney Channel film is often considered underwhelming due to its lack of artistic merit and poor acting. However, in Susan Sontag’s 1964 essay, “Notes On ‘Camp,’” she argues that lowbrow media can still please audiences. Through the appreciation of exaggeration, androgyny, failure of seriousness, and stylization, camp shows how the exaggerated performances of High School Musical 2 generate its appeal despite its lack of quality content. In “Notes On ‘Camp,’” Sontag’s purpose in her argument is to define camp as “a certain mode of aestheticism,” arguing that camp celebrates exaggeration, artifice, and performance, challenging audiences' understanding of good and bad taste and how some objects that are perceived as bad can nonetheless bring audiences pleasure (Sontag 2). While Sontag has many rules for what defines a camp object, High School Musical 2 is most aligned with her ideas on exaggeration and artifice, androgyny, consistency, and failure of seriousness, which provide criteria for the reinterpretation of the Bad Object and help explain its appeal as a movie of pleasure.
Sontag does an excellent job of building a clear, understandable criterion for camp, as it’s often vaguely understood and hard to define. She provides a way to interrogate Bad Objects and Bad Subjects with 58 notes of criteria for what’s determined as camp, covering everything from exaggeration and artifice to double-meaning, androgyny, seriousness, and more, offering a reinterpretation and a way to analyze texts in new ways. However, 58 notes is a lot of information just to synthesize the meaning of camp, particularly since the sense of camp is also intangible. Sontag’s analytical weaknesses are furthered by how she takes away queerness from camp. Sontag was bisexual and Jewish, and this fed into her understanding of camp and her social and cultural status, but given the inextricable role of camp in the queer community, Sontag doesn’t give queer people the credit they deserve. As a result, her framework doesn’t fully address the roots of camp or analyze it in its entirety. Although her framework has some flaws, it’s very connected to High School Musical 2 and enhances audience understanding of the film.
High School Musical 2 fits Sontag’s criteria of exaggeration and artifice. Sontag argues that camp is about seeing everything as exaggerated. Camp is unnatural, and it’s about aesthetics. Sontag said, “the essence of Camp is its love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration” (Sontag 1). High School Musical 2 embodies the unnatural and exaggerated, as characters bust into song and dance throughout the film. The most notable character that embraces artifice and exaggeration is Sharpay. At the beginning of the film, when the characters arrive at a country club to spend their summer, Sharpay arrives in a pink car with a little dog with a tiara in a pink bag as her accessory. She then heads to the pool, where she is the only one in a pink pool chair, wearing pink from head to toe, busting into the song “Fabulous.” This scene is extremely exaggerated and artificial, as Ryan plays piano in the pool with Sharpay lounging on top of it, and one of the workers serves Sharpay a platter of turkey from Maine as she sings, “Towels imported from Turkey, Turkey imported from Maine,” an extremely artificial meal to serve someone at a pool generally, much less in Albuquerque (High School Musical 2 13:29-16:50). In this scene, the workers all cater to Sharpay and serve her whatever she wants while a group of girls follow her around like they worship her. Not only is extravagance clear in the visuals, but also the lyrics as Sharpay sings, “I want fabulous, That is my simple request, All things fabulous, Bigger and better and best” (High School Musical 2 13:29-16:50).
This scene connects to Sontag’s criteria of camp as she argues that camp is about excess. According to Sontag, “The hallmark of Camp is the spirit of extravagance. Camp is a woman walking around in a dress made of three million feathers. Camp is the paintings of Carlo Crivelli, with their real jewels and trompe-l'oeil insects and cracks in the masonry” (Sontag 7). Furthermore, Sharpay follows the rules of camp because everything she wears and does is excessive. For example, when she goes out to play golf with her family, her golf outfit consists of a glittery pink and green top and a tiara, and she drives a pink golf cart and makes her family walk. She also makes the drummer give her a beat when she exits a room, and she gets everything she wants, including pulling all the strings she can to win over her crush, Troy.
Additional notable examples of Sharpay embodying the unnatural and exaggerated are her performances, which include background dancers, special effects, and elaborate costumes. For example, there’s a bizarre scene where Troy is ushered in by the country club manager Fulton, to watch Sharpay and Ryan perform the song “Humuhumunukuapua'a,” a culturally questionable performance in which the two sing in loosely Hawaiian-inspired lyrics with glittery outfits and lit torches. Additionally, Sharpay wears a pineapple on her head, and Ryan wears a tiki warrior outfit (High School Musical 2 43:12-46:17). In all of the Sharpay and Ryan performances, Sharpay is the center of the spotlight and Ryan is to the side, highlighting the dynamic of Sharpay being the extravagant twin and Ryan as her supportive ‘other’ on stage, a difference in power. Sontag’s explanation of camp enhances High School Musical 2 by showing how elements of style, attitude, and power dynamics interplay to portray Sharpay as a camp character of extravagance and artifice, ultimately contributing to the film's appeal.
In addition, Sontag’s note on androgyny enhances the camp take on High School Musical 2. Sontag sheds light on the cultural status of High School Musical 2 as a queer film when she argues that camp favors feminine men and masculine women. According to Sontag, “What is most beautiful in virile men is something feminine; what is most beautiful in feminine women is something masculine. . . . Allied to the Camp taste for the androgynous is something that seems quite different but isn't: a relish for the exaggeration of sexual characteristics and personality mannerisms” (Sontag 4). A notable character that embodies androgyny is Ryan, Sharpay’s brother. While Ryan is never explicitly identified as queer, he is extremely flamboyant in both style and character. He is often seen in the film wearing a fedora or a newsboy hat and a preppy outfit that matches Sharpay's. Further, he’s often pursuing hobbies deemed feminine, such as going to the spa with the family and directing performances. A humorous scene that highlights Ryan’s queerness is the golf scene where Ryan’s dad says, “Son, you’ve been working out,” and Ryan says, “Yoga,” and then his dad says, “Bring that around, there you go,” and adjusts Ryan’s hat to make him appear more masculine (High School Musical 2 34:37-43). However, despite Ryan’s queer signals, Troy is threatened by Gabriella (Troy's girlfriend) and Ryan’s relationship, believing that they have feelings for each other. For example, in one scene, Ryan and Gabriella are talking by the pool, and Ryan says, “Too much?” referring to his busy, extravagant, and flamboyant outfit, Gabriella goes, “Only in daylight” (High School Musical 2 1:08:09-1:09:23). They then proceed to dance, and Troy looks at Ryan and Gabriella like they betrayed him.
It’s also ironic that in High School Musical 3, a romance sparks between Kelsi, the piano player, and Ryan. Kelsi is a queer-coded character as well, which is signaled by her long shorts, funky hats, and awkwardness. Being portrayed as a straight character despite queer signals is especially interesting when situated in the film's historical context because it wasn’t until the 2010s that Disney included explicitly queer characters in their content. Disney has avoided open queer representation, as the company is historically conservative, and High School Musical 2 demonstrates that audiences and Disney (at the time) were not open to queer characters. Disney has changed over time and has since become more accepting of queer representation. This change in acceptance informs the work's cultural status and the understanding that Ryan reads as queer.
Not only does Ryan have queer mannerisms, but so does the basketball team. A notable example is the baseball game scene where the basketball players break into dance moves to the song “I Don’t Dance” on the baseball field. The scene is ironic because Chad says he doesn’t dance, even though he dances multiple times throughout the movie and in this song. The hyper-masculinity of the basketball players supports Sontag's idea of “Being-as-Playing-a-Role” (Sontag 4). In this scene, all the guys are dancing on the field with baseball bats, which feels very queer, yet they reject performing in the musical since it goes against their masculine roles. The rejection of being feminine and playing a masculine role while simultaneously being feminine connects to Sontag’s idea of duplicity. Sontag argues, “To camp is a mode of seduction - one which employs flamboyant mannerisms susceptible of a double interpretation; gestures full of duplicity, with a witty meaning for cognoscenti and another, more impersonal, for outsiders. Equally and by extension, when the word becomes a noun, when a person or a thing is ‘a camp,’ a duplicity is involved. Behind the ‘straight’ public sense in which something can be taken, one has found a private zany experience of the thing’’ (Sontag 5). Furthermore, Sontag argues that there’s a difference between the audience's understanding and the movie itself, or the production context. The basketball players are camp because their characters have a meaning for the general audience and a different meaning for Bad Subjects, who understand the film as a performance. The basketball players transform the role of masculine athletes into a show, revealing the exaggeration that allows for camp appeal. While High School Musical 2 affirms hegemonic structures of heterosexuality and high school popularity, its exaggeration and performative gender roles create ambivalence.
In addition, High School Musical 2 is camp because it has consistency in character and its seriousness fails. Sontag argues that for something to be camp, it must have passion and consistency. Sontag said, “Camp is the consistently aesthetic experience of the world. It incarnates a victory of ‘style’ over ‘content,’ ‘aesthetics’ over ‘morality,’ of irony over tragedy” (Sontag 10). High School Musical 2 is consistent because the characters remain in the same roles in each film, with little character development. For example, in each film, Sharpay is portrayed as a consistently high-maintenance, rude, popular girl; Troy is portrayed as the heartthrob jock, and Gabriella as the shy, nerdy girlfriend. There is little to no evolution in character. Not only is the film consistent in its characters, but also in its unawareness and failure of seriousness. Sontag argues that camp texts have a complex relationship to seriousness. Sontag said, “In naïve, or pure, Camp, the essential element is seriousness, a seriousness that fails. Of course, not all seriousness that fails can be redeemed as Camp. Only that which has the proper mixture of the exaggerated, the fantastic, the passionate, and the naive” (Sontag 7). High School Musical 2 fails at seriousness because it has passionate intent, but poor execution. This is clearly illustrated in Troy and Gabriella’s flirty dynamic. There are many scenes where Troy and Gabriella painfully flirt with each other in cringey ways. For example, they have a picnic on the golf field and throw grapes into each other's mouths, and then Troy says, “May I have this dance?” and Gabriella says, “Well, of course you may,” in a fake accent and bows (High School Musical 2 26:07-22). There’s also a scene where Troy sees Gabriella at the pool and says, “Hey, lifeguard,” and jumps in, and Gabriella shouts, “You’re crazy, wildcat!” (High School Musical 2 48:20-26). It’s clear that the couple has a passion for each other, but the acting and script are awkward and naive. These lines are meant to be serious and not told in a joking manner, which ironically and inevitably makes the seriousness fail. An especially notable example of failed seriousness is Troy's performance of the song “Bet On It.” In this scene, Troy dramatically storms across the golf course alone, dancing on his knees, jumping, reaching out with his hands, and making fists (High School Musical 2 1:27:42-1:31:02).
This scene is intended to be serious because Troy is upset since he found out his friends couldn’t perform, and he doesn’t know where he stands with his relationship with Gabriella and his future. However, the intended seriousness fails since the choreography is excessive and exaggerated. This scene is overly dramatic and bad, but its ambition distinguishes it as camp rather than simply bad because of its passionate intent, shedding light on the cultural status of the media artifact and enabling us to ascertain its appeal.
In addition, High School Musical 2 is considered a Bad Object because it’s a movie perceived by an audience of Bad Subjects as entertainment. Sontag agrees with this, as her framework of camp enables the audience to ascertain the appeal of the Bad Object as a form of enjoyment. In rule #55, Sontag said, “Camp taste is, above all, a mode of enjoyment, of appreciation - not judg-ment. Camp is generous. It wants to enjoy” (Sontag 13). In its historical context, High School Musical 2 was viewed as an enjoyable movie for young kids in the mid 2000s because they aspired to experience young love like Troy and Gabriella's. At the time, Zac Efron, who plays Troy, was considered a heartthrob, and many audiences developed celebrity crushes on him. The passage of time has changed this: mid-2000s Disney teen romances and heteronormative shows used to dominate but are now of less interest to newer audiences and are viewed for nostalgia or watched ironically by audiences who were there for the release and have now matured and understand the film differently. The corniness of Troy and Gabriella’s dynamic can now be found in memes, where the passage of time has turned the cringiness into humor. Zac Efron has lost his appeal, and the cast isn’t as relevant anymore. Disney Channel's prime was in the mid-2000s and has since lost significant viewership due to the emergence of streaming and changes in consumer behavior. This changes the movie's cultural status.
The Bad Subject’s interest in pleasure is also achieved when watching this film because everything ends happily, and there is no tragedy. According to Sontag, “Camp and tragedy are antitheses” (Sontag 10). For example, even though the workers were banned from performing in the summer showcase, Gabriella quit her lifeguarding job, and she and Troy broke up, at the last second, Kelsi and Ryan came up with a plan to save the day, surprising Troy with Gabriella on stage to sing a song together that Troy had only a few minutes to learn. While the two are singing the song, everyone joins on stage in-sync choreography, knowing every lyric despite just learning the song (High School Musical 2 1:38:10-1:42:37). Bad Subjects enjoy this type of content because, although it’s artificial, it’s pleasurable to feel that everything worked out in the end. The film comes to a close with the cast busting into the song “All For One,” singing the lyrics “Everybody one for all, and all for one” with conflict fully repaired (High School Musical 2 1:45:21-1:49:23). Ending happily ever after ties the film together as a camp object, and audiences leave feeling the pleasure they hoped for.
High School Musical 2 is camp because it meets Sontag’s ideas of exaggeration, artifice, androgyny, consistency, and failure of seriousness. These ideas help shift audiences' understandings of the film as a Bad Object, allowing audiences to find pleasure in its performance. Whether it’s Sharpay’s excessive glam, Ryan’s queer signals, or Troy and Gabriella's cringey banter, Sontag helps audiences appreciate the film's failure. As the High School Musical series has aged, the films have become a form of nostalgic pleasure. It’s interesting to think about how the film will be understood in the future, given its increasingly sophisticated and camp-aware audiences.
