+
upworthy
Family

Kid belts out every word of a song from the new 'Matilda' and Dad's response is hilarious

'Don't tell me you can't memorize your math tables no more.'

musical theater, matilda, parenting

11-year-old Nathan belts out "Naughty" from "Matilda."

As a parent, you want your kid to find their space in the world, discover what they're passionate about and build the skills needed to be successful in whatever path they choose.

You also want them to do their dang homework. Even the stuff they aren't particularly thrilled about.

Balancing those things isn't always easy, especially when you have a kid who has very specific interests and very specific non-interests. And that familiar struggle is hilariously depicted in a delightful, viral family car ride.


In the video shared by Samantha Broxton on her TikTok channel, 11-year-old Kevin sits in the back seat singing his heart out to the song "Naughty" from the new Netflix version of "Matilda." The film was just released in December, which makes it all the more impressive that Nathan knows the whole thing by heart.

The "by heart" part is what prompted Nathan's dad, Kevin, to pause the song part-way through and interject with the most classic dad comment ever.

"Don't tell me you can't memorize your math facts no more," he said. "OK? I don't hear that. Multiplication, division, all that. Don't tell me you can't do it."

Kevin is a musician himself and a fan of musical theater and you can see him enjoying Nathan's singalong, but he's also a dad wanting his kids to get the most out of their education. He may have a point about where his son puts his memorization energy, but that didn't deter Nathan from waiting patiently for Dad to turn the song back on so he could continue his performance.

@raisingself

Let’s just call this Nathan’s audition for Matilda the Musical!

In Nathan's defense, it iseasier to memorize things when they're put to music, which is why Schoolhouse Rock! exists. Perhaps Nathan should find a program that puts math facts to music, though that's still not quite as much fun as singing along to "Matilda."

Samantha tells Upworthy that Nathan has been into musicals since "Hamilton" came out, which makes what happened after this video went viral all the more exciting for the Broxtons.

As the "Matilda" video started circulating on Twitter, another video of Nathan singing in the car started making the rounds along with it. In this one, he is singing "Wait for It" from "Hamilton."

His passion is so clear that it even caught the attention of Leslie Odom Jr., who originally performed the song in the role of Aaron Burr on Broadway. Odom shared the video with a message of praise for Nathan.

"Young brother is far more committed than I even dreamt of being at his age," he wrote. "This is conviction! And I love to see it. On this trajectory, he'll eclipse me in no time."

The family was blown away by the tweet.

"I’m so touched by Leslie acknowledging our Nathan," Samantha says. "We think Nathan is talented and could really be amazing in the theater world, but we are obviously very biased as his parents and family. Hearing from someone like Leslie Odom, Jr., with his body of work and broad range and depth of talent, it was really like an overwhelming external confirmation that something similar might really start to be possible for Nathan in the near future."

Nathan's reaction to seeing Leslie Odom Jr.'s tweet, shared by Samantha with his permission, is so pure.

@raisingself

Shared with permission from Nathan. He is so thankful for everyone’s kind words and encouragement. This year he want to get voice lessons and dance lessons and get even more serious about Musical Theater.

Samantha says she and her family have been sharing stories from everyday life on social media for a few years. "It truly is a labor of love, rooted in the desire to build community and share what we have and are actively learning about family, love, healing and adulting," she says, adding that their content is mostly unscripted and that their children have a say in what they post and how the videos are edited. "This is super important to us," she says. "We make the decision to continue to make content as a family, and we wrestle with it every year."

With the positive feedback Nathan is receiving from the musical theater community and people in general, it appears it was definitely a good choice this year.

A pitbull stares at the window, looking for the mailman.


Dogs are naturally driven by a sense of purpose and a need for belonging, which are all part of their instinctual pack behavior. When a dog has a job to do, it taps into its needs for structure, purpose, and the feeling of contributing to its pack, which in a domestic setting translates to its human family.

But let’s be honest: In a traditional domestic setting, dogs have fewer chores they can do as they would on a farm or as part of a rescue unit. A doggy mom in Vancouver Island, Canada had fun with her dog’s purposeful uselessness by sharing the 5 “chores” her pitbull-Lab mix does around the house.

Keep ReadingShow less
Representative Image from Canva

Let's not curse any more children with bad names, shall we?

Some parents have no trouble giving their children perfectly unique, very meaningful names that won’t go on to ruin their adulthood. But others…well…they get an A for effort, but might want to consider hiring a baby name professional.

Things of course get even more complicated when one parent becomes attached to a name that they’re partner finds completely off-putting. It almost always leads to a squabble, because the more one parent is against the name, the more the other parent will go to bat for it.

This seemed to be the case for one soon-to-be mom on the Reddit AITA forum recently. Apparently, she was second-guessing her vehement reaction to her husband’s, ahem, avant garde baby name for their daughter, which she called “the worst name ever.”

But honestly, when you hear this name, I think you’ll agree she was totally in the right.

Keep ReadingShow less

An English doctor named Edward Jenner took incredible risks to try to rid his world of smallpox. Because of his efforts and the efforts of scientists like him, the only thing between deadly diseases like the ones below and extinction are people who refuse to vaccinate their kids. Don't be that parent.

Unfortunately, because of the misinformation from the anti-vaccination movement, some of these diseases have trended up in a really bad way over the past several years.

Keep ReadingShow less

A beautiful cruise ship crossing the seas.

Going on a cruise can be an incredible getaway from the stresses of life on the mainland. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t an element of danger when living on a ship 200-plus feet high, traveling up to 35 miles per hour and subject to the whims of the sea.

An average of about 19 people go overboard every year, and only around 28% survive. Cruise ship lawyer Spencer Aronfeld explained the phenomenon in a viral TikTok video, in which he also revealed the secret code the crew uses when tragedy happens.

Keep ReadingShow less
Joy

Kudos to the heroes who had 90 seconds to save lives in the Key Bridge collapse

The loss of 6 lives is tragic, but the dispatch recording shows it could have been so much worse.

Representative image by Gustavo Fring/Pexels

The workers who responded to the Dali's mayday call saved lives with their quick response.

As more details of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore emerge, it's becoming more apparent how much worse this catastrophe could have been.

Just minutes before 1:30am on March 26, shortly after leaving port in Baltimore Harbor, a cargo ship named Dali lost power and control of its steering, sending it careening into a structural pillar on Key Bridge. The crew of the Dali issued a mayday call at 1:26am to alert authorities of the power failure, giving responders crucial moments to prepare for a potential collision. Just 90 seconds later, the ship hit a pylon, triggering a total collapse of the 1.6-mile bridge into the Patapsco River.

Dispatch audio of those moments shows the calm professionalism and quick actions that limited the loss of life in an unexpected situation where every second counted.

Keep ReadingShow less
Joy

Yale's pep band had to miss the NCAA tournament. University of Idaho said, 'We got you.'

In an act of true sportsmanship, the Vandal band learned Yale's fight song, wore their gear and cheered them on.

Courtesy of University of Idaho

The Idaho Vandals answered the call when Yale needed a pep band.

Yale University and the University of Idaho could not be more different. Ivy League vs. state school. East Coast vs. Pacific Northwest. City vs. farm town. But in the first two rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament, extenuating circumstances brought them together as one, with the Bulldogs and the Vandals becoming the "Vandogs" for a weekend.

When Yale made it to the March Madness tournament, members of the school's pep band had already committed to other travel plans during spring break. They couldn't gather enough members to make the trek across the country to Spokane, Washington, so the Yale Bulldogs were left without their fight song unless other arrangements could be made.

When University of Idaho athletic band director Spencer Martin got wind of the need less than a week before Yale's game against Auburn, he sent out a message to his band members asking if anyone would be interested in stepping in. The response was a wave of immediate yeses, so Martin got to work arranging instruments and the students dedicated themselves to learning Yale's fight song and other traditional Yale pep songs.

Keep ReadingShow less