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Dallas
Observer
TheaterJones
Fort
Worth Weekly
Audience
Members
Erica Harte and B.J. Cleveland in
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
Photo by Eric Younkin
Can you spell g-r-e-a-t? Theatre
Arlington can
By PUNCH SHAW
Special to the Star-Telegram
ARLINGTON -- This city is famous for its
athletic competitions, from the Texas Rangers and the
Dallas Cowboys to the glory of the coming Super Bowl. But
Theatre Arlington has found a field of play where the
excitement and tension of competition reaches a new zenith
that makes those sports events look fainthearted and
frivolous: spelling.
The 25th Annual
Putnam County Spelling Bee, the show currently
agonizing over consonants and vowels at the theater, takes
us inside the terrors and pitfalls of stringing together
letters to build words while the pressure is on. And as if
those words weren't difficult enough in this hysterically
funny musical, the motley crew stepping up to the
microphone all have issues that can't be solved by a
dictionary.
Take William Barfee (B.J. Cleveland).
Please. Chronic respiratory problems, a peanut allergy and
a gift for condescension are among his more endearing
qualities. But he is a spelling maniac who has a special
trick for checking his letters.
At the other end of the spectrum is the
relentlessly bubbly, plaid-skirted overachiever Marcy Park
(Mary Jerome), who participates in the bee because she
participates in everything.
Logainne Schwartzandgrubenniere (Megan
Kelly) is an earnest competitor, but she has trouble
dealing with her two dads. Olive Ostrovsky (Erica Harte)
just hopes her one dad will attend the bee.
And poor Chip Tolentino (Jason Kennedy).
His Scout uniform and merit badge sash suggest that he has
things under control. But being a good speller is not much
help for an adolescent dealing with distractions from the
opposite sex, and he learns that it can be tough to be a
stand-up guy.
Presiding over this parade of misfits are
teacher Rona Lisa Peretti (Jenny Thurman) and Vice
Principal Douglas Panch (Todd Hart). The former yearns to
be back in the bee's spotlight, while the latter just
wants to be anywhere else.
The voices are great overall, and Kennedy
and Harte especially make you wish they had more numbers.
DALLAS
OBSERVER
Theatre Arlington's Spelling Bee, a Winner
For its version of The 25th Annual
Putnam County Spelling Bee, Theatre Arlington has done
what Theatre Three didn't do last fall: Cast it right. B.J.
Cleveland, Megan Kelly Bates and Darius Robinson are the only
overlaps for both productions. Bates once again plays Logainne,
the grammar school activist in tight pigtails; Robinson repeats
his role as Mitch Mahoney, the bee's militant "comfort
counselor." Cleveland, however, gets the part he should
have had before. In wrinkled khaki shorts and saddle oxfords, he
is William Barfee, the sad adenoidal spelling whiz who works out
words with his "magic foot."Around those three old
pros revolves a young cast perfectly picked for this likable
musical's odd gimmick of having adults play six awkward
adolescents. Erica Harte is a little heartbreaker as Olive, the
smart tulip in pink overalls whose parents were too busy to show
for her big moment. Her voice on "The I Love You Song"
is so sweet you'll want to hug her and make her a sandwich.
Jared Johnson displays the right space-cadet charm as hippie-kid
Leaf Coneybear, who goes into a funny trance to spell the names
of South American rodents. Mary Jerome turns cartwheels as
serious contender Marcy Park, who speaks six languages but is
tired of competition. As Chip, the Eagle Scout (and previous bee
champ) whose unfortunate burst of manly desire causes public
humiliation, Jason Kennedy works a mean unibrow. Todd Hart and
Jenny Thurman are the real grown-ups. He's a stitch playing the
deadpan vice principal who'd rather not have to repeat and
define "boanthropy" and "vug." She's the
chirpy bee sponsor who utters hilarious descriptors for each
speller as they approach the microphone (and that includes four
civilian spellers plucked from the audience each night, so be
prepared to be embarrassed).
Well, there are consonants, too. Theatre Arlington is next in
line for "The Bee."
by Mark Lowry
The 25th
Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee only won two of
the six Tonys for which it was nominated in 2005. But compared
to the other shows in that category—The Light in the
Piazza, Dirty Rotten Soundrels and Monty Python's
Spamalot, which took the big prize—the Spelling Bee
creators will be raking in a whole lot more royalty dough in the
coming years.
After the local professional-production barrier
was broken last year by Theatre
Three, the Bee is already on the books this year
for community theaters in Grapevine, Bedford and Plano.
Currently, this easy-to-cast crowd-pleaser is the choice of
Theatre Arlington where, so far, it's winning the Best Local
"Bee" Production prize. TA's staging is directed by
Michael Serrecchia, with musical direction by Don Powers.
The show (music and lyrics by William Finn, book
by Rachel Sheinkin, conceived by Rebecca Feldman with additional
material by Jay Reiss—whew!) was born from an improv
skit about elementary kids at a Spelling Bee, played by adults.
It grew into a Broadway musical that, surprisingly, only ran for
two years and some change.
The sketch comedy roots still peek through, and
that's a good thing. It allows for actors in the roles of the
six kid spellers and three adult supervisors to go wild with the
interpretations. Not only will you see a different Bee
at each performance, thanks to the device of using four spellers
from the audience, but each production of Bee could be
quite different and equally hysterical.
Theatre Arlington uses three performers from the
Theatre Three production, two of them in the same roles (Megan
Kelly as the do-gooder Logainne Schwartzandgrubenniere, who is
pressured to excel by her two fathers; and Darius Robinson as
the "comfort counselor"). B.J. Cleveland is the other,
but here he switches from Chip to a part way more suited to him,
stopped-up whiz kid William Barfee (it rhymes with
"parfait").
All three are great. Oddly enough, in a role
made for a ham, Cleveland is not as out-there as you might
suspect. He has a hint of ego underneath the self-effacing, and
his quirks are reigned in. It works splendidly.
The other spellers—Jason Kennedy as
puberty-plagued Chip Tolentino; Jared Johnson as super-spaz Leaf
Coneybear; Mary Jerome as overachiever Marcy Park; and Erica
Harte as the wordgame-loving and neglected Olive Ostrovsky—all
offer tight, funny and suitably sung turns, with Kennedy
emerging as the champ in the vocal department.
The songs deal with their quirks and
insecurities, but also offer insight into each of the kids' home
lives, which takes the show beyond comedy sketch and into the
land of fleshed-out, if not necessarily deep, musical comedy.
Jenny Thurman makes for a
saucy-when-she-needs-to-be Rona Lisa Peretti, the realtor who
once won the bee by correctly spelling "syzygy," and
Thurman can belt with the best of'em. As Vice Principal Douglas
Panch, Todd Hart gets to do the part that calls for the most
on-the-spot comedy, depending on the audience spellers at each
performance (at the performance reviewed, the first audience
speller was wacky and not only misspelled her word, but spelled
another, very different, word). His impulses are as quick and almost
as funny as T3's VP, Paul Williams.
The best line about an audience contestant at
the performance reviewed: So-and-so "has a tramp stamp of
'The Last Supper,' " spoken with deadpan hilarity by
Thurman.
This Bee is well-done and ready for
audiences to eat up. And that they will do.
Spelling Bee Scores
The
25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is given an uproarious
reading by Theatre Arlington.
by Jimmy Fowler
The word “cartoonish” is typically used as
an insult, but it describes all the best qualities of Theatre
Arlington’s tearfully funny staging of The 25th Annual
Putnam County Spelling Bee — brightly colored, sharply
drawn, and buzzing with the kind of manic inventive energy that
normally only a Pixar movie can generate.
Putnam County Spelling Bee displays a
masterfully light touch with a variety of moods –– sweet and
edgy, smart-ass and nostalgic –– and the raucously charming
cast seizes every opportunity to score canny comic points while
reminding the audience how incredibly stressful and demoralizing
being a kid can be. Serrecchia gives each character’s “Look
at me, ma!” moment a surreal edge... All the action is
underscored with tacky vigor by choreographer Megan Kelly
Bates’ witty dance moves, incorporating girl-group shimmies,
Broadway hoofing, and hip-hop gestures.
If any one of the marvelous performers is
primarily responsible for keeping Spelling Bee tight
and acerbic, it’s [Todd] Hart as weary, bitter Vice-Principal
Panch. He’s responsible for giving the bee competitors their
words and any background information that will help them. As
played by Hart, Panch has been on administrative autopilot for
years and is eager to extinguish any signs of enthusiasm that
his young charges might dare to show. He challenges one
participant with the esoteric term “phylactery.” Definition,
please? It’s a small leather box worn on the arm or head
during certain Jewish temple observances. Um, could he use it in
a sentence? Hart pauses with barely restrained impatience and
finally drones, “Put down that phylactery, son. We’re
Baptists.” Burnt-out authority figures are just one of the
childhood perils that Theatre Arlington’s riotous production
nails handily.
This is just a portion of the review.
Read
the entire review here.
We
went to see the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
production last night, and it was wonderful!! Acting was
terrific, and all of the cast were superb.
-Anonymous Patron
I
loved it! If you haven't seen it...please call Troy & make a
reservation.
-J.Hart
Everyone
I demand you go see Spelling Bee at Theatre Arlington! It is a
fantastic cast and show. It is by far my favorite show I have
seen at TA.
-R. Tyler
The 25th Annual Putnam
County Spelling Bee
April 9 - May 9, 2010
Theatre Arlington
305 W. Main St.
Arlington
$20-$22
817-275-7661
www.theatrearlington.org
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It's a "can't-miss" for sure. I was fortunate enough to be in the cast last Friday night - what an honor.
-B. DeVoe