Suessical!

Last Saturday, Andrea and I ventured out from the Fortress of Ineptitude to see our daughter Randie in her first live stage production, a performance by her high school of Seussical the Musical. 

Which shows we love our daughter very much because Saturday is Doctor Who night at Geeksboro.  

Seussical is a musical based on stories by Dr. Seuss, mainly "Horton Hears a Who!", "Horton Hatches the Egg" and "Miss Gertrude McFuzz" but many, many others are also in the mix. The show debuted on Broadway on November 30, 2000 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, the same theater where In the Heights and Hamilton by my good buddy, Lin-Manual Miranda was staged.

Seussical did not enjoy such levels of success. Reviews were mostly "meh" and the Broadway production closed on May 20, 2001. But Seussical remains a favorite for schools, communities, and regional theater productions. and its easy to see why. It's a musical with lots of different opportunities for solos, duets and ensembles. The costumes are wild and colorful. The set is a surreal collection of brightly painted objects. There's stuff to do from young kids to adults and everyone in between.  

The principal driver of the "plot" such as it is Horton who...

• Hears a Who. Well, several Whos.
• Winds up sitting on a egg.
• Ends up in Palm Beach, Florida. 

...

Yes, Palm Beach, Florida. And the rest of the cast winds up there, too. Somehow. I think. I'm not actually sure. 

But that's the kind of absurdist humor that dominates the play. One minute you're in the Jungle of Nool, then you're with Whos of Whoville and then of course you go to Palm Beach, Florida. 

Because that's what you do.

Randie was one of the Whos in Whoville and a bang up job she did of it too. It was not easy getting there. She complained the director paid no attention to the Whos unless they did something wrong. 

Hey, Randie. That's life in the chorus.  

Despite that, I hope Seussical is not her first and last play. She has a lot of talent and spirit.  

Seussical was a high school production but a lot of the individual performances elevated this show to a higher level. Andrea and I went into this mostly to support our daughter but we were very well entertained. 

Doctor Who rules the roost on this blog for Saturday and Sunday. Until next time, remember to be good to one another. 

Below is a photo of the cast Andrea took after the show.

I'm sure Randie won't mind me posting this here.

Yeah, she's cool with it.