Review: 'The Addams Family' Is So Good, It'll Wake The Dead
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David Slone-dslone@timesuniononline.com
“Live Before We Die” is a song in Act II of “The Addams Family” – which debuted Wednesday night at the Wagon Wheel Center for the Arts – that best summarizes what the musical is about at its core. The opening stanza is: “Let’s live before we die. Let’s laugh before we cry. Let’s hold each other tight and die. Let’s try before we fail. Let’s fly before we bail. Let’s keep things black and white and dance!” It’s not only a great motto to live your life by, it’s also how I felt leaving the theater after the show – full of laughter and happiness, and just wanting to go dance. That’s the core message of the show – live and enjoy life, don’t be afraid of death because it’ll happen, but just love life while you’re in it. With that upbeat theme, “The Addams Family” last night also earned its place in my top five list of the funniest shows I’ve seen at the Wagon Wheel in the 11-plus years I’ve been covering the Warsaw theater. It’s just lively and humorous and entertaining. I would go see it again in a heartbeat (and I should have taken a selfie with the entire cast in their full costume last night, too). The dialogue is quick-witted, sly and snappy. There’s references to new pop culture (“The Hunger Games”) and old (“Fly me to the Moon, Alice”). Some jokes are tongue-in-cheek, while other funny moments are very physical like the dancing in “When You’re an Addams.” I was expecting a Michael Jackson “Thriller” dance reference in there, but “The Bunny Hop,” “The Twist” and “rigor mortis” are sufficient. In the musical, The Addams oldest child, Wednesday (Clara Cox), is grown up and has fallen in love with a “normal” man, Lucas Beineke (Keaton Eckhoff). The two plan to have a dinner with both of their families to announce they plan to get married. Of course, nothing goes as they hoped especially since Wednesday wants her family to be “normal” for one night. And Lucas’s family has issues of its own. Also, Gomez (Danny Burgos) keeps a secret from Morticia (Ellen Jenders) that threatens to tear the Addams family apart because they never lie to each other or hide anything from one another. What is normal anyway? Who defines it? Why must we judge others on our definition of normal? Those are some of the questions “The Addams Family” ponders. Making the comedic script work so well is the amazing cast on stage for this show, starting with Burgos. Interviewing Burgos Monday afternoon, we discussed briefly how his favorite past performance of Gomez was Raul Julia’s in the 1991 film “The Addams Family” and 1993 flick “Addams Family Values.” Julia definitely would be elated with Burgos’ interpretation of the role as Burgos made it his own. Burgos was great as Bernardo in “West Side Story,” but he’s phenomenal as Gomez. He’s got natural timing for delivering the punchlines, a flair for whipping out the zingers and just a robust fun energy that surrounds his performance. In the song “Happy/Sad,” Gomez tells Wednesday how he feels about her being all grown up. Burgos delivers the song so well that it’ll touch your heart. Audiences will be glad during the run of this show that he made it up here from Florida. But what’s a good Gomez without a matching Morticia? That would be like Clyde without Bonnie, Tony without Maria or Elvis without Priscilla. Luckily, the Wagon Wheel has Jenders this season to play a stern but playful and sexy Morticia. Audiences who saw “Bye Bye Birdie” will remember how well Jenders did in that show as Rose Alvarez. She turns up the heat in “The Addams Family,” not only in “Tango De Amor” but throughout the show. She makes the dark look flaming. Audiences also may remember Scott Fuss as Albert Peterson in “Bye Bye Birdie,” but his performance as the bald and lumpy Uncle Fester surpasses that. Fester serves as a sort of narrator for the musical, but there are parts where Fuss’s performance make him deserving of a Tony Award. One particular stand-out number for Fuss as Fester is “The Moon and Me” in Act II. There’s a lot of things that make the number work so well – lighting, props, costumes, staging – but Fuss just gives the song a ton of warmth and sincerity that notes on a page alone can not provide. It has to come from within, and Fuss brings that out with his rendition of the love song to the moon. All the actors playing a member of The Addams Family are layered with great costumes and well-applied makeup, but longtime Wagon Wheel favorite Jennifer Dow as Grandma Addams wins the prize for being the most transformative. If I hadn’t seen the program with her name listed in that role, I may never have guessed it was her. She not only looks like a 106-year-old woman in the costume and makeup, but she also moves like one throughout the entire show. She sustains believability from start to finish. Over the many years I’ve known Dow and seen her perform on stage, I’ve always said she was the Lucille Ball of the Wagon Wheel. That’s not changed and her performance as Grandma Addams just reinforces that. She’s kick-butt awesome in comedic roles like this one. Over the years Andy Robinson has had many roles in Wagon Wheel shows, some bigger than others. As Lurch – The Addams Family’s zombie butler – Robinson doesn’t have many lines but just moans and groans a lot. Yet towering over everyone else in the estimated 8-inch platform shoes, Robinson is unforgettable. Nicholas Lowman also does nicely as Pugsley Addams, the youngest child of Gomez and Morticia. Pugsley’s actions in the second half of Act I change the lives of the show’s characters. But it’s Lowman’s sweet performance of “What If?” that will make audiences both laugh and say, “Awwww.” The plot revolves around Wednesday, but that’s the character I struggled with the most. Not because of Cox’s performance – it was great and Cox really can sing, dance and act hands down. My struggle was with the character as I felt Wednesday in the musical was more like Anne Hathaway (in movies like “The Princess Diaries” before taking on more serious roles in films like “Les Miserables” and “Brokeback Mountain”) rather than Christina Ricci (Wednesday in the 1991 and 1993 “Addams” films). Ricci is the Wednesday of all Wednesdays, the one that all Wednesdays have and will be compared to. Yet, because of Wednesday’s feelings of love for Lucas, in Act I of the musical she’s happy and smily and wearing yellow in the musical. Yellow! Addams don’t wear yellow! Even when Wednesday was torturing Pugsley, I kept waiting for her to belt out “Tomorrow” from “Annie” rather than the song “Pulled.” I fully understand that Wednesday’s more “normal” attitude and appearance is the plot device for the show, but it still lacked authenticity for me. Luckily, Wednesday goes back to black for Act II. As for Wednesday’s and Lucas’s relationship, when they sing “Crazier Than You” in Act II, I couldn’t help but recall the number “Take Me or Leave Me” from the musical “Rent.” Wednesday and Lucas, like Maureen and Joann, are opposites in many ways, but yet they’re good together. For story purposes, it works, and Cox and Eckhoff are young emerging talents to take note of as they continue to grow as artists. Along with Eckhoff as Lucas, there’s also the extraordinarily talented Jordan Edwin André as Lucas’s father, Mal, and Kira Lace Hawkins as his mother, Alice. There’s so much talent in that threesome that you could write a show just around them. And – being a member of the Hawkins fan club – when she belts out “Waiting” toward the end of Act I, it’s just pure awesomeness. There’s so much to love about this show – major kudos to the Ancestors, costume designer Stephen R. Hollenbeck, director and choreographer Scott Michaels – that you just need to go see this finger-snapping fun event. You’ll laugh until it hurts, in a good way. My rating of “The Addams Family” (out of four): 4. “The Addams Family” is at the Wagon Wheel through July 25. Tickets are on sale at Wagon Wheel Center for the Arts or can be purchased online at wagonwheelcenter.org The cost of admission is $32 for adults, $24 for seniors, $18 for students and $14 for children up to age 12. Call the box office at 574-267-8041 with any questions. The show is presented by DePuy-Synthes.
