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For
the second straight year, I planned to do A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum as the middle
camp show, and for the second straight year, I was convinced to replace it
with something else. In 2003 it was Chicago,
which when I saw it at the movies I thought was too good to pass up. This
time, it was Sarah Davis who convinced me to put on Little Shop of Horrors instead. I was a little hesitant at
first, since we had done Little Shop at
Natchez at least twice in the early ‘90s and I remembered not
thinking it was all that great. The 1986 movie with Rick Moranis and the incredibly annoying Ellen Greene
didn’t help either, but as with Grease,
the stage version is much more interesting. The songs themselves, composed
by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman of Disney animation fame (The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin), are actually pretty good.
The
first half of 2004 was a busy one for me, as I was teaching in one school
and coaching baseball at another, so I asked Sarah to write the adaptation for
me, which I would then revise and tailor to my own specifications before
sending it in to camp. Unfortunately she was rather busy too and didn’t
get around to it until late; she started writing an adaptation but it
contained essentially all of the play’s first few scenes, and therefore
was already running long. I ended up rewriting almost all of it, although I
still gave Sarah much-deserved credit for her work on the adaptation.
Given
the time constraints, I also couldn’t really listen to or learn all
of the songs from the Broadway show. The commercial songbook only contains
the songs which are in the movie, but as it turned out those would be
enough for our purposes. The stage and screen endings are also different,
but the music amounts to reprises of “Suppertime” and “Somewhere
That’s Green,” and even though “Don’t Feed the
Plants” is not in the film, it is in the songbook.
Speaking
of plants, the most obvious logistical challenge on this show would be to
create the giant talking man-eating plant which is the centerpiece of the
original Roger Corman B-horror film and the
musical adapted therefrom. I decided to put Sarah
in full charge of creating the plant, by whatever means she saw fit. I
honestly didn’t want to deal with it. She set to work on creating a
puppet. Cara, for her part, had the task of creating a substantial quantity
of props and costumes, including the miniature Audrey II plant (and the
five identical ones to be used in the closing number), the Dentist’s
jacket, signs for Mushnik’s flower shop,
and more.
The
2004 subbie division had waited an extra year for
first dibs on the main leads (as we had expanded Chicago to include the subbies the year before), and it was
apparently worth the wait as we had not only a wealth of talent, but good
fits for each part. Michael Warren, one of the best pre-teen male singers I’ve
ever heard, was a clear choice for Seymour, and he simply shone on stage, not
only with his powerful voice but with some impressive acting chops to go with
it. As great as he was in The Nightmare
Before Christmas, he might have been even better here, having matured so
much as a performer. Amanda Cohen, a revelation this year whose incredible singing
voice had somehow been overlooked in previous shows’ auditions, was
cast as Audrey. Sarah worked very closely with Amanda on the “Audrey voice”
and “Audrey walk,” and the result was exceptional. Even though
Amanda’s performance in Wicked the
following year is better remembered, this one was just as deserving, if not
more so.
We
had so many talented girls audition for Little
Shop that we had to double the number of Chorus Girls and put them into
two groups: inters Nina Carlin, Brooke Schwartz and Cara Schrank were one group, and the other consisted of subbie Kacie Friedman and
juniors Bryanna Mazzella
and Brittany Grimaldi. Ashley Lynette, new to
camp in 2004, was cast as Mrs. Luce for the “Meek Shall Inherit”
number.
Mark
Hartenstein, back for his fourth show in three years, got the part of the Dentist
and had great fun with it, finally getting to sing again after doing such a
nice job as Gavroche in Les Mis but having to settle for
speaking roles in Chicago and Phantom. Mark is a dedicated, hardworking
performer, always an asset to the cast of any show he is in. So is David Galimidi, for whom we found a speaking role as the
customer who first notices the “strange and interesting plant”
in the window of Mushnik’s flower shop.
Speaking of which, no one could have played Mr. Mushnik better than junior
Eric Thurm, still honing his comedic skills and
hamming it up to the hilt, although I had to work with him on his
borscht-belt accent.
My
favorite casting story on this show is that of the man-eating plant, Audrey
II. Originally we cast Brian Leigh, a very good singer who had done well in
The Nightmare Before Christmas and
Grease, to be the voice of Audrey
II, which he would perform offstage with the puppet onstage. As much as I
regretted having to “hide” Brian from the audience, he had the
best voice for the part. However, as we got closer and closer to the show
with no sign of the puppet, I began to get the feeling that this puppet was
not actually going to happen, so we needed a Plan B. One day in rehearsal I
told Brian to go on stage, stand in the flower pot and perform “Feed
Me” with Michael. As he began to sing the number’s second
stanza, he began to move with the music in his own unique, inimitable
style. Brian’s moves are really indescribable, but even with his feet
immobilized at the bottom of a giant flower pot, it was fantastic and I
loved it. Right then and there I decided that we didn’t need the
puppet, that Brian absolutely had to perform Audrey II on stage himself. Not
only did this solve what could have been a huge logistical problem, it gave
a talented young performer a chance to do his thing on stage.
What
we ended up doing with Brian costume-wise, since we never did produce a
head-piece for the plant, was dress him all in green and cover him with
both natural and artificial leaves and branches, paint his face green with
flecks of other colors to make it look more natural and menacing, and put
giant foam leaves on his arms. All that combined with the fact that Brian
was a bit bigger at 13 than many of his castmates,
particularly Michael, Eric and Amanda, made for a very good visual effect.
Given how difficult I knew it would be to pull off, I was very pleased with
the final result.
Little Shop was one of those shows that
somehow become overlooked in subsequent years, but was really one of the
best we ever did. Watching the video now I can’t find many flaws, and
I’m awed by the performances of all the lead actors.
_____
Pontiac Players present
LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS
Music by ALAN MENKEN Book and lyrics by
HOWARD ASHMAN
Based on the film by ROGER CORMAN
Screenplay by CHARLES GRIFFITH
Principal Cast
MICHAEL WARREN as Seymour
AMANDA COHEN as Audrey
BRIAN LEIGH as Audrey II
MARK HARTENSTEIN as the Dentist (Orin Scrivello, D.D.S.)
NINA CARLIN, CARA SCHRANK, BROOKE SCHWARTZ,
KACIE FRIEDMAN, BRITTANY GRIMALDI and BRYANNA MAZZELLA
as Chorus Girls
ERIC THURM as Mushnik
JOSH HOUSMAN as Bernstein
ASHLEY LYNETTE as Mrs. Luce
DANNY SKLAR as Skip Snip
Directed by JAY BRAIMAN, SARAH DAVIS and CARA FARRIS
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