FANCIFUL FEATURE: Magical musical covers ‘forbidden’ love, comedy, coming of age

WASILLA — Fans of the more light-hearted, modern adaptations of Shakespeare’s classic tale of forbidden love are bound to like “The Fantasticks,” cast members say.

“The whole play is like a big Romeo and Juliet, except the parents actually want ‘em to get together,” said Drew Larson, a soon-to-be-graduate of Wasilla High School.

Though “The Fantasticks” is the longest running off-Broadway musical (and it’s on Broadway this month), none of the eight-person cast in Valley Performing Arts’ (VPA) production said they had heard of the show before it showed up on the local docket.

Director Dave Nufer — a retired Finger Lake Elementary school principal who this season starred in “Fruitcakes” at VPA — said the small cast and prolific representations made the show a good fit for his first musical.

“It’s a good one to cut my teeth on,” Nufer said.

Who’s who

Following the R-and-J storyline, Larson plays the Romeo-like character, Matt — a “very pretentious” 19-year-old who thinks he knows “everything there is to know about life,” Larson said.

Opposite Larson is Colony High School junior Jessica Rentz, who will be making her VPA debut as Luisa, the 16-year-old daughter of a button maker.

Though Matt and Luisa appear to be madly in love with each other, their fathers reveal early on that it was actually their idea to bring the children together — by trying to keep them apart.

The two fathers sing a song in the show that describes how they were able to set their plan in motion, with one simple word.

“If you want to manipulate children, you merely have to say, ‘No,’” said Henry Woodall, who plays Luisa’s father, Bellomy, in the show.

Rentz agreed, saying that it’s very much the thought of having an affair with Matt that appeals to Luisa, and vise versa.

“They’re not so much invested in each other as they are in the idea of each other … as princess and hero,” Rentz said.

To complete the charade, Bellomy and Matt’s father, Hucklebee (Todd Broste) enlist the help of the somewhat villainous El Gallo (translated from the Spanish as “rooster”), a kind of narrator-puppeteer that brings the play-within-a-play feel to the show.

“He basically guides people into and out of the situations where they should and shouldn’t be,” said Garry Forrester, who plays El Gallo in the show.

Forrester described his character as “a good bad guy,” who first manipulates the young people at the fathers’ bidding, but later becomes a sort of conscience for them.

El Gallo’s villainy, though, is in a way what enables his redemption, Forrester said, in that it gives the character more room to grow and change.

“When you’re bad, the sky’s the limit,” Forrester said.

Necessary revisions

To begin with, El Gallo is something of a wheeler and dealer, and in the first act of the show convinces the fathers to pay him to put on a “Raid Ballet,” or staged abduction where Matt can be branded a hero for rescuing Luisa. This scene was once particularly controversial, in that the ballet number was originally called the “Rape Ballet.”

Though claims have been made that the word “rape,” back then, implied kidnapping without sexual assault, the lyrics to various songs in the play were gradually revised to eliminate the word from the show completely.

“You can say it’s not really about rape, of course, which we did for a long time. But then why are you going on about rape? You’re getting laughs from the shock value. And rape isn’t funny any way you slice it,” said writer Tom Jones, in a 2012 interview with Playbill.com writer Robert Viagas.

(The Tom Jones author of “The Fantasticks” is not the same Tom Jones known for pop hits like “What’s New Pussycat,” whose given name is Thomas John Woodward.)

An earlier version of the play called “Joy Comes to Deadhorse,” performed at the University of New Mexico in 1956, was set in the American West and used several derogatory terms toward Native Americans — including “half-breed Apache” — which were also removed, though one character still dons a so-called American Indian costume in the raid scene.

Secondary characters

Putting on the raid requires the services of El Gallo’s own theater troupe, consisting of a mute, an old Shakespearean actor named Henry, and another actor named Mortimer who specializes in death scenes.

Played by Mark Hermon, Mortimer’s job is primarily to provide comic relief, Hermon said, often misinterpreting or forgetting his directions — and of course, dying.

“He’s a character I get to have a lot of fun with, and there’s a lot of room for improv,” Hermon said.

Steve O’Brien, who recently played Lazar Wolf in “Fiddler on the Roof” at the Glenn Massay Theater, plays Henry in “The Fantasticks,” and Bianca Purcell plays the mute. Purcell, a seven-show veteran of VPA, said she was glad to have a break from lines memorization, but challenged to use exaggerated gestures and facial expressions to make herself “heard.”

“I have to show not only them (the troupe) but everyone else what I’m thinking,” Purcell said.

As the mute member of El Gallo’s troupe, Purcell often plays a prop herself, becoming a physical wall between the two lovers, for example.

With such a deliberately simple set, “the audience is required to use their imagination,” she said.

Those up to the challenge can use their imagination on opening night, which is Friday, May 6 at 7 p.m. Additional shows are on Fridays at 7 p.m., Saturdays at 7 p.m., and Sundays at 2 p.m. through May 29.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.