Theater Review Part Deux: Footloose

by John Garcia of John Garcia's The Column

In what has become a common theme in musical theater, Footloose: The Musical is based on the motion picture that made Kevin Bacon and his extremely tight jeans into a major star during the '80s. Bacon portrayed "Ren", a city kid who has to live in Bible belt country where dancing is forbidden. He takes on religion, the Minster, and the city council all because he wants to thrust his groin into the air. In the end Ren succeeds and they hold a dance in some warehouse, sprinkle some glitter on the saw dust floor, and shake their groove thang. All the while wearing hideous prom gowns & lame tuxedos that would make Carrie White torch the place down for such vile fashion sense. But that's a different movie. And musical.

Footloose: The Musical opened at the Richard Rodgers Theater in October 1998, and would dance to the tune of 709 performances, closing in July 2000. When I saw the production on Broadway, I walked away enjoying the dancing and the star-making performance of Jeremy Kushnier (Ren). A year later I saw the national tour, and this time around I only walked out enjoying the dancing.

While hearing the well-known tunes from the film's soundtrack is fun, what whacks off the dancing legs of this musical are the horrendous book and its new songs, which serve only as bland, colorless filler to stretch the evening. The book leaves some principals with nothing to bite their teeth into, no arc, and no vocal solo.

The book is completely spineless in emotional strength or true substance to invest interest or feel for the characters. You just sit in the dark waiting for one of those famous hit singles to pop up and warble on stage. The majority of the new songs just stop the action dead in its tracks, not enhancing the storyline or characterizations of anyone. Alas Footloose is one of those "jukebox" musicals that withers away with the other corpses of musicals that were created from hit films, only to fail miserably.

Repertory Company Theatre (RCT) decided to breathe life back into this jukebox musical, but alas is only able to sustain a slightly beating heart. These are the reviews that I dread to write because as a performer myself, I totally understand, relate, and can so empathize with all what it takes to put on a show. Believe me, it is tough emotionally & physically to do musical theater. Thus, while I applaud and sincerely wish nothing but great success to RCT, this production carries quite an armful of problems.

From the design elements, it is the sound design that just wreaks havoc on the production. The body mics popped constantly throughout the evening. I don't know if it's the design of the mic, but they picked up every loud breath or would sound like the actor banged his head against the wall, resulting in loud, intrusive bangs and pops all night long. When someone would start to walk or run away, the mic picked up the gusts of wind or loud breathing, echoing into the audience. This was a major nuisance that could not be ignored.

Another glaring design problem was the video screen that hung dead center. Throughout the show various pictures would pop up on the screen. Only due to the lights on stage, it washed out many of the pictures, resulting in squinting your eyes trying to make out what on earth is on that video screen. It is obvious that this was designed to help the audience know where we are within the book scenes, but instead it served as a glaring distraction.

Then there are the taped orchestrations. I sincerely do understand today's rising cost of hiring musicians for an orchestra, it is expensive. But this is a musical, and you honestly need live music - not taped. From the actor's point of view, it completely cuts off the creative ability to be "in the moment" or explore a new emotion on subtext "live" right there on stage in the middle of a song. Why? Because you have to stay with the tape's tempo. A good, reliable musical director will know how to follow the actor's emotions, a tape doesn't.

Sadly the orchestrations for the tape version of this Footloose made the music sound cheap, tinny, and amateurish. This resulted in many of the ballads and up-tempo numbers to have a tacky, lifeless vibe of sounding like a bad night of drunken karaoke. You need live, thumping drums to make those rock flavored up-tempo numbers come alive. Taped music made these numbers sound like drill team taped music. This was an injustice to the hard work provided by the cast. You need live musicians. Period.

Kim Buchly's choreography was pleasurable and did pump up much of the energy within the cast. The best choreographed number was the Act One closer, "I'm Free". Oddly enough it takes place in a gym, so you do think for a second if High School Musical was accidentally slipped in. But it wasn't. It really does take place in a gym.

There are some situations and changes within the show that I did find puzzling as the evening wore on. Such as why the entire cast spoke with such heavy, thick country accents? Sure it takes place in middle America, but subtle would have sufficed here. At times some cast members sounded like hillbilly Cletus from The Simpsons.

Another problem was during the number "Somebody's Eyes". The trio of girls and cast hold umbrellas, and you hear the sound effects of rain. Then out of nowhere, the lights appear on a jeep where Ren is getting a ticket -- but here a bright, sunny glow of sunshine light is bathing the cop and Ren, where on stage left it is dark and raining. It didn't help that they were not very far apart. It left you scratching your head in the dark.

Also it sounds as though several songs were cut down drastically. I remember some numbers being longer with more verses and dance breaks, here they sound whittled down.

Finally, another glaring problem was what occurred in Act Two. The character "Rusty" is assigned the Denise Williams dance hit, "Let's Hear it for the Boy". She sings this to and about Willard and his "lack" of dancing skills. It's "supposed" to be a character song for her, to help cement her feelings towards Willard.

In a perplexing twist, the song is now being sung by the Country waitress/singer named "Irene". This just made no sense whatsoever, and severely destroyed the needed emotions and subtext to believe in Rusty and Willard's blossoming romance. The book sure as hell doesn't help this couple, but that song did. I just did not get it here.

Many of the cast do provide pleasant performances, but quite a few of them struggled vocally. At times some performers were completely under the pitch or were drowned out by the unbalanced sound of live voice & taped music. Or the notes were too high or too low, resulting in some grappling with the music.

However, it is the acting of some thespians in this cast that does shine brightly within their talents. The best scene work appears in the second act between Darin Fimple (Rev. Shaw Moore) and Ren (Curt Mega). Both actors play off each other beautifully as they discuss and argue about those who leave us. Fimple and Mega bring out touching and painful eloquence from their emotions and the interaction between them rings organic truth.

Speaking of Mega, as "Ren" this talented actor carries the show well, although I fear the score is a bit out of his vocal range in several of the songs assigned to his character. But he does possess a striking stage presence and electrifying energy that never subsides.

Within the large company providing audience pleasing performances include Brittany Ryan Levraea (Ariel); Josh Hepola (Coach Dunbar); Loree Westbrooks (Eleanor Dunbar); and Laura Alley (Wendy Jo).

Stealing the show is Drew Kelly as "Willard". This actor has a firm grasp on how to create funny and thoroughly enjoyable characterizations with his keen sense of comedic timing, pace, and delivery. Earlier this season he was a stand out in GCT's All Shook Up, and he again succeeds here. Kelly has the best male singing voice on stage, which is a shame since he only has two solos. He gives the right amount of jovial laughs to his second act number "Mama Says", creating the best number of the evening.

Yes, sadly this production is weighed down with problems. But I hope you will take this into consideration and still go snatch at ticket at RCT.

This is one person's opinion - and we all know how that saying goes. I am an actor who has seen so much Broadway and national tours. Many "non-theater" people (i.e. regular audience members) don' t have that background. Thus they will most likely not notice many of the issues I have discussed. To serve as an example, as my guest and I were leaving the theater, an elderly couple was walking in front of us. I overheard the husband turn to his wife and say, "That was quite good. I really enjoyed that." And isn't that what theater is meant to be? To enjoy?

GRADE: C-

Footloose: The Musical runs through July 27 and tickets can be purchased by calling 972-690-5029.