Large audiences laughed and cheered during the Yale School of Medicine (YSM) MD Class of 2025 Fourth Year Show, enjoying the pop culture-infused comical plot, where Dean Nancy “Scooter” Braun—and her team, including Dean Jessica Charluzzi XCX—tried to make all YSM students perform poorly, so that they only matched at Yale and would never leave New Haven. When Dean Charluzzi XCX points to the complicating factor of the ongoing LCME reaccreditation review, Braun says they just have to figure out how to sabotage the students without the school being shut down. This leads to one of the many creative modified songs sung throughout the show— “You Belong With Nancy,” a play on Taylor Swift’s “You Belong With Me.” (The deans also snuck brain-eating worms into the free lunches YSM and Yale New Haven Hospital provide students on their Internal Medicine clerkship, which led the students to believe they never wanted to leave Yale.)
A witty script and song lyrics, outstanding singing, creative choreography, clever projections, and fun costumes and props combined to make the graduating class’s annual parody of the school, faculty, and medical students a highly-entertaining evening for the YSM students, faculty, staff, family, and friends gathered in Mary S. Harkness Auditorium on April 25 and 26. (See the related links for the show's Playbill® program, which has a complete list of the talented cast and crew.)
Origin story
Graduating MD students Madee Ehrenberg and Hale Jaeger wrote, directed, produced, and performed in the show entitled Yaleor Swift – The ERAS Tour. (ERAS® is the centralized online application service medical students use to deliver their applications to residency programs.) Ehrenberg and Jaeger said the idea for the theme began as a shared iPhone note in 2021. “Which one of us originally dreamed up the Taylor Swift rock opera is lost to history, but the important part is that the dream became reality. We've been sending ideas back and forth via text and voice note for four years, compulsively writing more songs as YSM '25 lore developed, and our favorite pop diva released more earth-shattering records.”
The collaborators share that the first time they read the full script, “we were cracking up the whole time, having so much fun that a stranger told us we clearly were doing something we loved. It made it feel so real and exciting that we invited him to the show, and he was in the audience on opening night.” Ehrenberg and Jaeger also expressed how much they enjoyed watching their friends have fun bringing their characters to life. “Sharing this with the Class of 2025 and all of YSM has been the most special part of this year.”
Act 1
The cast’s camaraderie and spirit (and comedic/musical talent!) were on full display during the show. Kevin Okifo, who seemed to have a different Taylor Swift-like outfit on in each scene, was hilarious as Yaleor Swift, as were pant-suit attired Dhatri Abeyaratne as Dean Braun, who effortlessly moved around the stage using a kick scooter throughout the show, and Ehrenberg as Dean Charluzzi XCX, who tried to emulate Braun by using a scooter, but struggled awkwardly.
The show took the students through the different “eras” of their medical school experience, starting with the pre-clerkship phase, before shifting to an amusing tour of each of the eight clerkship components. Noah Brazer, Morgan Brinker, Jaeger, Hang Nguyen, Anishaa Sivakumar, and Sarah Wilkins played off each other with amusing energy as the students—and Okifo’s (Yaleor Swift’s) classmates.
The students poked fun at their curricular experience, often through songs. For example, in the Emergency Medicine rotation, Yishak Bedaso, playing the character of Sam Buck, sang out “it’s not an emergency, it’s a boo boo baby, so why did you come here.” During the Surgery rotation, students compete against (and defeat) surgeons in a game of SURGERy FUED, a play on the gameshow Family Feud. Carlisle Topping was outstanding as emcee, playing the character of Dave Stitelman.
At the end of the clerkship era, the show broke for Intermission, which included funny, creative videos from the MD Classes of 2026, 2027, and 2028, suggesting the Fourth Year Show will be in good hands in the future. The first years had students and deans swapping roles for the day, while the M2s characterized the Yale System as a helpful medication. The Class of 2026 video reflected a Board Exam anxiety dream, with a student running from exam room to exam room in the basement of Harkness, diagnosing patients on a timed multiple exam test.
Act 2
When the Fourth Year Show returned for Act 2, the students were preparing for their Boards, because despite the deans’ attempts to make things difficult for them, the students had performed well. The students soon learned that a massive cheating scandal made the Board Exam optional, so they stopped studying and began focusing on clerkship interviews. The students performed an amusing rendition of “I Hope I Get It,” a play on the original song from A Chorus Line. Though the students initially think they only will match at Yale, in a transformational group interview with Jason Ryan (played by Robert Cotter)—a doctor in the real world with an educational platform to help students study for Step 1—the students realize they are qualified to apply anywhere they want for residency.
This leads to a final scene—with Match Day and Commencement combined into one ceremony— where everything ends happily. The students excitedly match at a variety of places, including Yale. The deans realize they actually are proud of the students—and Dean Braun also realizes a worm had been eating her own brain, causing her manipulative behavior. Dean Charluzzi XCX says that maybe the goal is not to keep everyone at Yale, “but to bring Yale to everyone.” Referring to YSM in one of the closing songs, the students sentimentally sing, “Please don’t be a place I can’t come back to. Please don’t be a place I can’t call home.”
Reflecting on the production, Ehrenberg and Jaeger said, “Thanks to our dedicated cast and crew, everything came together and the show that once seemed impossible is being realized onstage.” And reflecting on their Taylor/Yaleor Swift theme, Ehrenberg and Jaeger note that if the on-theme department ads in the show’s program, and the participation in the faculty video “(better margins than the Graduation Questionnaire, probably)” are evidence of anything, “it's that maybe the world's greatest cultural icon since The Beatles was a decent touchstone to bring people together.”