Millbrook: "The Addams Family Musical"

"It's just a simple dinner...what could go wrong?" -- Quite a lot, it seems, in the Millbrook Community Players' delightfully antic production of The Addams Family Musical. 

When teenaged "Goth" Wednesday Addams [MaryBella Pemberton] invites her "normal" boyfriend Lucas Beineke [Gabriel Miller] to dinner so their families can approve of one another before the young couple announce their engagement, and Wednesday conscripts her doting father Gomez [Connor Sparks] to keep it a secret form her mother Morticia [Maggie Kervin]..."What could go wrong?" indeed.

The characters that Charles Addams created in print went on to a popular television program, and this 2010 Broadway musical has become part of the standard repertoire in American theatre ever since, both for its nostalgic family driven story and its charming musical score. 

Millbrook's opening night audience instantly responded to the characters depicted authentically by its talented ensemble actors. -- In addition to the aforementioned, there are the masochistic younger sibling Pugsley [Analeigh Silas], dottering Grandma [Paiton Lamb-Doyle], a naively romantic Uncle Fester [Nick Warman] who falls in love with the Moon, and the almost silent butler Lurch [Alac Dixon]...all of them instructed to be on their best behavior to welcome Lucas and his "normal" parents Mal [Ben Holland] and Alice [Julianne Hansen]. And, by the way, there's a 10-member chorus of Addams Ancestors, ghostly specters who help keep the action moving.

For all their idiosyncrasy, the Addams family are actually pretty normal; we watch parents and children, husbands and wives, with normal concerns for everyone's welfare, and reliance on trust and love to carry them through. And the Beineke family, for all their "normalcy" have a few secrets themselves. -- And we get caught up in their problems and cheer them on to find appropriate solutions when the dinner party gets about as chaotic as it can when they play the game "Full Disclosure", and we trust the outcome will be happy.

Director Kaden Blackburn keeps the action lively, though lengthy scene changes slowed the pace, and trusts his cohort to inhabit their characters fully. And they are up to it: the personifications are spot-on, the movement is energetic and purposeful, and the singing is excellent.

With Kat Barlow's effective choreography, Julianne Hansen's excellent character-driven costumes, and Steve Pennington's fine music direction, audiences are taken on an enjoyable ride in one of Millbrook's most solid productions.

Way Off Broadway Theatre: "Wait Until Dark"

Now and then, almost everyone enjoys a good "scare", especially from the comfort of a darkened theatre...and Wait Until Dark is a reliable conduit.

Written in 1966 by Frederick Knott [he also wrote Dial M for Murder], and adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher, it his perhaps best known for the 1967 film starring Audrey Hepburn, and the Prattville Way Off Broadway Theatre iteration as directed by Lily Farnworth ticks a lot of the boxes of the genre in her two-hour production. -- It's been a while since the River Region has been treated to this compelling play [2009 at Faulkner University and 2013 at the Cloverdale Playhouse], so a re-visit is worth the effort.

At its center is Susy [Tye Terrell-DeVore], who had been blinded in an accident, and whose war veteran photographer husband Sam [Evan Scott] goes away on an assignment, leaving her alone in their Greenwich Village basement apartment, a place she can maneuver easily as her other senses have been heightened by her blindness. Gloria [Ava Northington] is a neighbor child who reluctantly runs errands for Susy and looks in on her whenever Sam is away.

Of course, there's a problem: a dead body in a closet that must be removed, and a child's doll "given" to Sam by a stranger that contains a fortune hidden in it, and a trio of criminals who will stop at nothing to find the doll. The ringleader is Harry Roat [Eric Arvidson at his evil best], and his henchmen Carlino [Chase Massengale] who pretends to be a policeman, and Mike [Michael Moseley], allegedly Sam's soldier buddy who ingratiates himself with the trusting Susy.

The three criminals are constantly in and out of the apartment to interview Susy about a recent crime in the area, but actually to get Susy to reveal the doll's location. -- Susy gets suspicious about their behavior and figures out the trio's elaborate "signals", and as their threats become dangerous, she conscripts Gloria to assist in her determination to outwit them.

There is a lot of suspense that keeps audiences on the edge of their seats, and the climactic moments with all the apartment's lights out are riveting [too bad that the WOBT stage was not plunged into total darkness]. -- Ms. Farnworth's ensemble actors inhabit their roles fully, enabling audiences to get involved in their lives. Well done.

Wetumpka Depot: "Don't Dress for Dinner"

"Too many cooks" might well "spoil the broth", but not so in a wildly improbable farce. -- Robin Hawdon's deft adaptation of Don't Dress for Dinner, one of a number of collaborations with playwright Marc Camoletti [see Boeing, Boeing, for example], which opened on Thursday to a small but appreciative audience at the Wetumpka Depot.

With its sharp dialogue and fast action, any of the improbabilities of the plot get thrown out the window as audiences' laughter keeps them from anticipating the action, and generates even more laughter as the characters attempt to extricate themselves from each turn of events.

Director Kim Wilson [formerly Mason] guides her six ensemble actors through the rigors of farce that includes mistaken identities, infidelity, slapstick, elaborate lies, and coverups.

Bernard [Will Webster] plans an intimate catered dinner and assignation with his mistress, a model named Suzanne [Dani Lowery], while his wife Jacqueline [Amber Chapman] is away; but when Jacqueline decides to forego her visit with her Mother, Bernard conscripts his friend Robert [Brad Sinclair] to rescue him. When the cook Suzette [Sydney Broach] before Suzanne gets there -- and both are called "Suzy" -- well, imagine the confusions that build over time. -- It's all good-natured sophisticated fun, with a rescue in the nick of time by Suzette's husband George [Jason Sizemore] serving as a kind of deus ex machina to unravel the truth.

Opening night jitters perhaps slowed the action a bit as actors often took too long to respond to cues and needed more purposeful movement; hopefully these matters will be remedied as the run of the play continues. Regardless, Don't Dress for Dinner is a mirthful escapist romp: something we all need these days.