School’s officially out for the summer, and the Wildcats are keeping the music alive at summer camp. EJ, Gina, Kourtney, Carlos, Ashlyn, and Ricky will be headed to Camp Shallow Lake for a summer of fun, laughs, and ultimately drama in High School Musical: The Musical: The Series season 3. EJ winds up becoming the director of the Frozen musical, and Matt Cornett told HollywoodLife EXCLUSIVELY that this twist definitely hinders EJ’s original plans.
“He’s going into the summer ready to have the best summer ever, and he’s quickly derailed by the fact that he has to be the director,” Matt explained. “It catches him off guard, so I don’t think he’s quite ready for it. He has no idea what to expect. He’s never done this before, so it kind of takes every bit of plans that he had and does the complete opposite. It throws everything out the window, and now he’s trying to navigate this summer and trying to figure out where to put his focus in different areas. So it’s tough for him. He gets very overwhelmed and makes a couple of mistakes as EJ does.”
EJ and Gina arrive at Camp Shallow Lake as the perfect summer couple. But will their happiness last? “It’s super fun. They’re starting the season happy and together. They’re excited to spend the summer together,” Matt continued. “Obviously, with EJ directing then there’s kind of some challenges that go with that because focus has shifted from trying to focus on the relationship flourishing at summer camp to now directing this show. There’s a lot of things that ensue. Good and maybe a little bit of some drama. I don’t know. But we’ll see. It’s a very exciting summer, and I think there’s a lot of things that people are going to love and a lot of things that people might not love. I don’t know.”
As for whether or not Ricky may cause problems — we all saw that moment in the season 3 trailer — for the couple, Matt said, “I don’t know. We’ll see. We’ll see where the summer goes.”
The Wildcats will be introduced to new characters, Maddox and Jet. They’ll definitely keep our faves on their feet this summer. “First of all, Saylor [Bell] and Adrian [Lyles] are talents. I mean, the talent that they possess is absolutely iconic,” Dara revealed to HollywoodLife. While the group may not get off to the best start with Maddox and Jet at first, Dara revealed that fans will be “really pleased to see how they slowly mingle into our circle and find their way with their own paths. They completely bring so much light to those characters, and they’re just wonderful, talented human beings.”
Camp Shallow Lake will be putting on a production of Frozen, which means we’re going to inevitably get some musical numbers from the beloved 2013 film. “Me, personally, my favorite song from Frozen growing up was the “For the First Time In Forever” reprise where they’re going back and forth as sisters,” Dara admitted. “One’s like, I got your back, and the other’s like, no, I don’t want to hurt you. I just thought their voices were so powerful. I can’t say what songs are sang but I will say it’s lit.”
EJ won’t be taking center stage in the musical this year, but his voice won’t be resting the entire summer. “You might hear EJ throw a couple of notes out of those vocal cords,” Matt told HollywoodLife. “There’s actually a duet that Miss Sofia Wylie and I have that is a very fun duet. It’s one of the songs that I personally am most excited for that I got to be a part of. It’s beautiful. And there’s all kinds of fun. I don’t want to say too much because I want people to experience it, but it’s so much fun.” High School Musical: The Musical: The Series season 3 premieres July 27 on Disney+.