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Off Topic => Daily Threads => Topic started by: scenicdesign71 on Mar 22, 2023, 06:18 AM

Title: 19 March 2023 Sunday - Did You See...?
Post by: scenicdesign71 on Mar 22, 2023, 06:18 AM
That show (https://sondheimforum.com/index.php?topic=2215.msg7515#msg7515) for which I was helping my friend Kis (https://www.kisknekt.com/)* make some clay sculptures had two previews this past Thursday and Friday before officially opening Saturday 3/18:

Production photos: https://www.facebook.com/LaMiradaTheatre/posts/pfbid0BDNXZFahutzTHCe7umBB5DDp3Ry8doVbxTqJGqAgnkRg3AYh5XzZDFrYX7jKqZR7l

Scenic model: https://www.facebook.com/LaMiradaTheatre/posts/pfbid0gxZeHZVPXTwb5tYcVQQQqy1MSoFQCiWy5258Um3Br1GeV3rByMQCUPpxKMNFvYznl

As far as Little Shop-esque gimmickry goes (Walter Paisley's script includes a direct and winningly self-deprecating nod to LSoH, complete with a brief sight-gag cameo by a baby Audrey II), the adaptors here have gone all-out, using puppetry (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNXtuszg6RY), animation, costumes and makeup, and plain old sculpture to sell the story's central horror-comedy conceit of corpses converted into art by being encased in clay -- and also to flesh out its device of having Walter's victims return from beyond the grave to haunt his conscience (as hallucinated voices (https://youtu.be/xAgZvV0Yi9A?t=3854) in the original film, but as tangible, drolly vengeful ghosts here).

The body count is much higher in this adaptation, with Walter creating a veritable menagerie of dead-animal "sculptures" before eventually moving on to humans -- who themselves include not only the movie's small handful of expedient kills, but also an additional montage's-worth of surreptitious serial vigilanteism purging the world of such undesirables as a purse-snatching mugger, a brazen litterbug, and a smoker who ignores no-smoking signs, among various others.

In the end, Kis (along with me, her sister, and one other assistant) created almost all of the non-puppet life-size animal sculptures (https://photos.app.goo.gl/LbBSRohA6NKhc8wd8), eight in total; plus two human busts based on 3D-printed scans of the actors' heads.  One of the latter is meant to look like a genuinely accomplished (i.e., not corpse-based) realistic clay bust (https://photos.app.goo.gl/XT87HWnMzGuEaZt29), slightly larger than life and described in the script as "exquisite" (no pressure or anything!) to reveal, in an ironic epilogue, that -- unlike in the movie -- our late lamented antihero actually harbored untapped artistic talent all along.  The other is an almost twice life-size bronze portrait bust (https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=6186244021434917&set=pcb.6186244478101538) of Walter himself (in this version, he ends up being posthumously fêted with a Lafayette Park memorial, his crimes having been successfully covered-up by his opportunistic gallerist), featuring a built-in trick (https://vimeo.com/810470213/0b1614b67a) engineered for us by a young puppeteer here in Brooklyn (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCRQOFdzNGU) to serve as a final "button" for the entire evening -- somewhat in the manner of LSoH's surprise "vine drop" during "Don't Feed The Plants," but even more pointedly surreal (think Carrie (https://museemagazine.com/features/2019/1/11/carrie-the-final-scare-readers-beware), perhaps) and physically much smaller.  (I'm told the entire stone plinth, with the bronze bust on top, moves directly downstage-center onto the apron for the final moment; I only hope they've managed to light this effect in such a way as to both withhold the surprise throughout the preceding scene and then accentuate it, when it occurs, for a quick but hopefully exciting gotcha! just before the final blackout).

I wish I could make it out there to actually see the finished production.  (It's been strange -- and of course, from a practical perspective, suboptimal -- working on these pieces from the opposite coast).  After feeling skeptical about the show based on its teaser (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5kd72T08vA) (made at least four months ago, with different actors and greenscreened backgrounds from the designer's sketches), I was recently finally able to read the the script, and found it much more enjoyable than I'd expected.  It won't redefine musical theatre as we know it, but it's a slick, witty and surprising adaptation which could make for a delightfully entertaining evening if the score (which I haven't heard) is as engaging as the libretto.

Indeed, audiences seem to like it (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qdc-HjJyszs).  The title, though... desperately needs rethinking, imho.


______________________________
* rhymes with "peace," short for Kirsten.


Title: Re: 19 March 2023 Sunday - Did You See...?
Post by: scenicdesign71 on Mar 29, 2023, 02:40 AM
Quote from: scenicdesign71 on 3/22/2023, 9:18:02 AM...I was recently finally able to read the the script, and ...  it's a slick, witty and surprising adaptation which could make for a delightfully entertaining evening if the score (which I haven't heard) is as engaging as the libretto.

???  Alas... according to Theatermania, "the musical's heaviest albatross is its uninventive score":

Review:  Did You See What Walter Paisley Did Today? Recalls Little Shop but Lacks Its Bite (https://www.theatermania.com/news/review-did-you-see-what-walter-paisley-did-today-recalls-little-shop-but-lacks-its-bite_1455237/)

I can't really agree or disagree, having still not heard any of it myself (apart from the mildly annoying earworm, from the title song, that they've used repeatedly in the trailer (https://youtu.be/FW8bTwnSQEI) and half a dozen other promotional spots (https://www.youtube.com/@LaMiradaTheatre)).  But the other reviews I've seen have been almost entirely enthusiastically-favorable:



Running through next Sunday, April 2 in La Mirada.

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