The ancestors look on at the Addams/Beineke Family dinner.
Just in time for Halloween, director Nancy Fracchiolla brings the delightful Addams Family Musical to the Palisades High School stage.
At a preview performance, someone was laughing loud in the mostly empty audience, and then I realized it was me.
When this show opened on Broadway, one New York Times reviewer wrote that it is “ A tepid goulash of vaudeville song-and-dance routines, Borscht Belt jokes, stingless sitcom zingers and homey romantic plotlines.”
True, true and true, but the reviewer failed to mention it was fun, spoke about marriages and left one happy after the show was over.
Although most critics hated the show on Broadway, it consistently played to 100% capacity and grossed third only to Wicked and The Lion King after it opened.
The PaliHi show is splendid, put down your television remote and plan to see a live show, with a pit orchestra, and some truly talented individuals, such as Annika Johansson (Morticia), who last year won as the Best Supporting Actress at the Jerry Herman High School Musical Theater Award Show.
Or Aurora Finetti (Alice Beineke), a senior this year who has never appeared in a school musical before because of prior commitments. She deserved a standing ovation for her performance as a “normal” mom at a family dinner in the song “Full Disclosure.”
The story is simple. Wednesday Addams (Ella White) and Lucas Beineke (Kian Mizban) have fallen in love and plan to marry.
What can go wrong when a normal family, the Beinekes meet the Addams family? Just about everything, especially when Pugsley Addams (Sabrina Hall), steals a potion from Grandma Addams (Eva Hefner) and Alice Beineke drinks it. Her poor husband Lucas (Kian Mizban) doesn’t know what to do.
Not often do high school productions get a call out for costuming, but Natalie Alpert and Henry Sims, have done a spectacular job. I would urge everyone to go to view the “ancestors” and the dancing (choreographer Hazel Clarke) and dance captain (Logan Christopher) is outstanding.
Conor Kowalski (Gomez), Uncle Fester (Jack Lochkheart) and Ivan Munn (Lurch) are also outstanding.
The only thing missing on the preview evening was an audience to share an enjoyable time in Mercer Hall with a terrific cast and production.
The show is at 7 p.m. on September 26, 27 and 28, and October 3, 4 and 5, at Mercer Hall, 15777 Bowdoin Street.
General admission is $18.85, and students are $11. Tickets can be purchased online at https://gofan.co/event/1707139
Uncle Fester sings to his “true” love, the moon.