Musical Theater – Page 16 – an intuitive perspective

November 18, 2023

Milwaukee Repertory Theater Launches The Holiday Season with Nuncrackers!

Yes, Nuncrackers, and it’s exactly what you think it is. The hilarious and slightly dysfunctional nuns of Nunsense are poised to bring you a portion of the Nutcracker ballet with pink tutus at the ready…but sudden disaster and hilarity ensues!

Do you need to have seen the original Nunsense to understand Nuncrackers? Heavens no! Like any successful sequel, author and composer, Dan Goggin has made sure that the characters are re-introduced and that any required story from Nunsense is back filled here. And quite frankly, I think that Nuncrackers might be even funnier if you don’t have knowledge of the original and come into the theater without any expectations or preconceived notions. But maybe that’s just me.

So here we are in the basement of the convent at Mount Saint Helen’s School, as Sister Mary Paul, Sister Mary Hubert, Sister Robert Anne, and Sister Mary Regina prepare to tape a Christmas show in their new TV studio for a public access channel. And they are being assisted by Father Virgil…not necessarily ably assisted but enthusiastically so!

photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater

The action revolves around the nuns presenting Christmas carols and some new songs that riff off of Christmas carols. There is an incredible amount of humor to be mined here! And in between the singing and dancing…Mr. Goggin has sprinkled in a generous supply of jokes, puns, and little skits. The front facing story is a lot, lot of fun!

There are a number of side bars here…they happen off stage and are relayed by our favorite nuns…or they are translated for us from several interrupting phone calls delivered by a black rotary dial wall phone. The phone and the mention of public access television, for me, was a bit of humor on its own since those are things are so very last century!

Fortunately for Milwaukee audiences, director and choreographer Kelley Faulkner understands the gags and songs and nuisances to a tee and has assembled the perfect ensemble to bring us the Little Sisters of Hoboken and of course Father Virgil! This troupe plays together like they have been a team for years. The rhythms and timing of the jokes is as quick and sure as the songs and dance numbers. All of the principles are remarkable in their roles. And after reading their bios in the playbill, I was amazed that three of our five actors have appeared on other local stages but are debuting at the Rep…and our other two intrepid nuns are debuting here as well. After this performance, I am sure that we will be able to enjoy their work in future Rep presentations for years to come.

Seth K Hale is Father Virgil…a role of a very humble and disarming priest but obviously inspired to assist the nuns to the best of his ability…and he is something of a ham as well. Hale embodies the character through and through.

As Sister Mary Regina, Ashley Ovidedo is an absolute scene stealer. An infectious presence on stage, I don’t think I have ever seen anyone adopt the character so absolutely as Oviedo does here. It was a literal thrill to watch.

And my goodness, the song and dance chops of Katie Kallaus as Sister Mary Paul, Meka King as Sister Mary Hubert, and Isabel Quintero as Sister Mary Regina are flawless…add to that their comedic gifts…and you have the perfect Nuncrackers! I really think that this is one show where the actors are having more fun than the audience.

Now, without being too much the spoiler, three things to watch for. The arrival of the Three Kings, the dueling sugar plum fairies, and the puppet. I hadn’t been promised a puppet, so I was amazed and pleased at its appearance.

Nuncrackers is my recommended start for this holiday season! And arrive early and have dinner and a refreshing beverage!!

Nuncrackers runs through January 7, 2024 at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s Stackner Cabaret. But this is an extremely popular musical, so don’t dawdle on acquiring tickets. You can do that HERE!

Extra Credit Reading: The Program

November 12, 2023November 12, 2023

Milwaukee’s Kith & Kin Theatre Collective Presents Pulitzer Prize Winner: Next To Normal!

Kith & Kin Artistic Director, Kimberly Laberge, brings another challenging musical drama to a Milwaukee area stage with Next To Normal. The musical’s book and lyrics were written by Brian Yorkey with the rock music by Tom Kitt. Next To Normal won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Best Drama.

This is the second time that I have experienced theater in the charming and inviting Interchange Theater Co-op’s black box theater. And this time, the room was filled with rock music telling a very difficult but engaging drama. We meet a very contemporary American family, mother, father, son, and daughter. And they have a secret…or maybe not a secret…but a dynamic that they are trying to gloss over until they can’t anymore.

So let’s meet our family! Diana Goodman is the mother, and at K&K she is played by Wendy Rightler. Her loving and supportive husband, Dan, is played by Patrick Jones. Sanaa Harper is their somewhat distant but determined daughter, Natalie and Daniel Bingham plays her brother Gabriel. There are two other cast members, Cory J O’Donnell who plays Natalie’s love interest and Justin Spanbauer who plays the part of two different doctors.

Dan and Diana foreground, Natalie and Henry to the right

Diana and Dan married relatively young and apparently very much in love. But Diana is struggling with a number of mental health issues…struggling for about sixteen years. Wendy Rightler’s portrayal of Diana is spot on throughout as Diana passes from lucidity to a bit of depression to confusion and back around. And Wendy’s vocals here are incredible…this is a particularly challenging role emotionally as well as vocally. Diana has the majority of the singing parts here. One of the family ‘secrets’ is how serious Diana’s illness can be at times…and Wendy’s performance here let’s us feel all of it and we wish we could intercede at some point.

Dan, as played by Patrick Jones, is desperately in love with Diana and struggles with her struggles. And he is willing to help and support her in any and every way that he can. And although he thinks he feels her pain, Diana lets him know that he just doesn’t quite get it. Patrick lets us see how Dan is feeling, his intense need to help, and his loss and frustration at his lack of success.

And our teen-age love interest? Sanaa Harper playing Natalie is a challenging and very determined teen with a goal and path clearly in mind…but she feels that she is on her own. Until Cory J O’Donnell as Henry strolls into her life. Of course there is the initial hesitancy, some on and off again moments, and little personal victories along the way. Sanaa and Cory were the ideal casting to represent this couple…and Sanaa can really effectively belt out the songs than bring us into the heart of soul of Natalie.

And then we have Gabriel…Daniel Bingham is absolutely amazing here. Gabriel has a key role in Next To Normal and Daniel inhabits it directly. His fluid movements across stage invest the character with the necessary presence and attitude. And his interactions with Diana and Dan are linchpin moments in the story…I don’t want to say more here.

And is there a doctor in the house? Well yes, there are actually two, both played by Justin Spanbauer in very very different guises!

Next To Normal is a hard charging rock musical with surprising little dialogue. And the cast members each have the range and strengths best suited their parts and characters. But the rock band is off to the left of the audience, side stage, but at stage level…and they are just too loud at times and the some very important vocal content got lost for me…particularly during ensemble numbers like the opening scene.

But kudos to director Kimberly Laberge and stage manager Brianna Cullen…the motion and interaction…on movements on and off stage…are so smooth and easy that the audience doesn’t actually catch notice. And normally a good lighting director goes unnoticed because the lighting works, but I noticed Erin Dillon’s lighting on Saturday night because it really works!!!

Kith & Kin is a relatively new theater group in Milwaukee, and you can read more about them here.

Next To Normal opened this weekend and repeats next weekend November 17 – 19, 2023. Order Tickets Here!

Complete disclosures: Kimberly Laberge and Brianna Cullen are personal friends. And the photos here were stolen from Kith & Kin posts on social media but I have been told that all photos are courtesy of Adam Harrison..

September 20, 2023

Milwaukee Rep’s World Premiere Rock Musical: Run Bambi Run

The Milwaukee Repertory Theater opened their main stage season in the Quadracci Powerhouse Theater with their World Premiere of their Rock Musical: Run Bambi Run. For many of you, this will ring a bell. And yes, it is a musical developed around the dramatic events in the life of Milwaukee’s Lawrencia Bembenek, particularly her conviction in the murder of her husband’s ex-wife, the turmoil around the case, the facts and fictions, the various men in her life, and her eventual escape from prison and capture in Canada.

This all started back in 2012 when the Rep’s Artistic Director, Mark Clements, engaged playwright, Eric Simonson, to write the book for a new original musical for the Milwaukee Rep. Simonson suggested the Bembenek story and he and Clements dug into the story. But they needed some help along the way and enlisted Gordon Gano, singer/songwriter from Milwaukee’s Violent Femmes, to write the lyrics and songs for the musical. So, under the direction of Mark Clements…we now have…the World Premiere of Run Bambi Run.

Erika Olson and cast. Photographer Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

The cast and ensemble are quite an active bunch. Everyone seems to play two or more instruments…guitars, bass guitars, accordions, drums, flutes, clarinet, cornet, trombone, violin, viola, string bass, and I am missing something here…oh yes three different types of ukulele. Plus keyboards and drums on the risers at the back of the state! So all of this provides ALL of the music during the performance. And all of this happens while dancing like dervishes and singing rock songs at 11. So, hats off to Dan Kazemi for his musical direction, Jenn Rose, Choreographer, and Stage Manager Kimberly Carolus for making sense of all of this and keeping the flow moving!!

Ripped from the headlines! And it looks like the headlines are the wallpaper each side of the proscenium and back stage wall! And it is a key part of the real star of the show…the set! Anchored in a period bar with appropriately aged red and yellowed linoleum covering the entire stage including the thrust out to the audience, Scenic Designer Scott Davis gets it real. Now the bar, ostensibly the Tracks, is represented with an old time wooden bar, high back bar stools, the aforementioned linoleum and newspapers, and stage left and stage right, a pile of musical gear cases and TVs that are used as props, exposition (on TVs), and podiums for the actors, and add flexibility to the action. Of course the linoleum floor provides the ensemble plenty of space to work their magic though out the evening.

But why is the set the star? Well Davis has to present different aspects of the Bembenek story without having to remove the bar accoutrements. So one of the hardest working ensemble casts also earn their stage hand cards by the constant trading off of instruments…but also pulling on, pushing off, assembling, discarding…from back stage, down the ramps, from corners unseen…the huge variety of tables, chairs, cells, wall, beds, etc…to move the action from bar to apartment to park to police station to jail cell to apartment to home to courtroom and back…over and over and over again. Wow!

left to right: John Carlin, Tommy Hahn, Erika Olson, Matt Daniels, Douglas Goodhart. Photographer Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

But where would Run Bambi Run be without Bambi. I think the Rep found the ideal actor of the role in Erika Olson. Once we were past the big opening number and Olson could settle into the character, we got a focused and determined woman who set out to achieve a number of lofty goals…some as an idealistic young woman…and others later thrust upon her. But Olson gave us a sense of person hood and energy and intention…even when Bambi sometimes made poor choices. And Olson certainly has the voice and vocal range needed to convey the message exhibited in Gano’s music and lyrics. As I said, we have the ideal actor for the role…and Olson left us no doubt about who Lawrencia is in this musical…we get the sense of a whole real person. Olson’s achievement left many of the other characters seem like caricatures.

In the last scene, Bembenek states rather sadly: ” it’s not right, it’s just not right”. To which a narrator from the ensemble adds, so is this a comedy? or is this a tragedy? or just a travesty?

My solid vote is : Travesty

ensemble cast. Photographer Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

Run Bambi Run continues through October 22, 2023. More information and tickets can be found here!

Extra Credit Reading: Program and Playguide.