SEDALIA DEMOCRAT

SFCC’s whiz kids to stage musical comedy ‘Urinetown’

By JOHN HANSEN

APRIL 26, 2011

When you gotta go, you gotta go, and when you gotta stay home, you gotta stay home.

One of the senior citizens groups that regularly attends the Sunday matinees at State Fair Community College has decided to take a pass (no, no, I said “pass”) on “Urinetown.” But in general, the unusual title of Mark Hollmann and Greg Kotis’ 2001 musical comedy has been a box-office boon for the theater troupe. It’s safe to say that ticket sales for the show, which runs Wednesday through Sunday, aren’t in the toilet, and folks will be streaming into the Stauffacher Theatre all week.

“There’s one group that might have been off put by the title,” director Eric Yazell said before Monday’s rehearsal. “But to be honest with you, we’ve had more people call in and say, ‘Hey, I want to see that, that sounds cool’ than we’ve had people complain about it. It’s an off-putting title, but it’s there for a reason. It’s making fun of itself. It’s making fun of that kind of musical.”

When it comes to her enthusiasm for the show, actress Megan DeHart, of Warrensburg, couldn’t hold it in: “It’s really popular. It’s won a bunch of awards and it’s known for being terribly hilarious. So I think everybody’s excited to see what we can do.”

More than just funny scenes of people dancing around and grabbing their crotch while waiting to use the public pay toilet, “Urinetown” includes many elements, all of which flow together nicely.

“It’s a satire on musicals, it’s a satire on government, it’s a satire on just the way our government controls or doesn’t control things,” Yazell said. “It makes fun of us in general, and it also has a more serious theme on water shortage. It even has a comment from the philosopher Malthus on how our population would outgrow our resources. So there are some serious parts, but really it’s just a funny musical. It makes fun of all sorts of musicals. I like to call it ‘Les Miz’ for dummies, because even I understand it.”

In “Urinetown,” the actors are presented with fresh challenges. For one thing, SFCC does an adult musical only once every two years. For another, the students are asked to break the fourth wall, something that goes against one of the first things they are taught. So the graduating sophomores who have learned all the rules of theater at SFCC are now ready to break some of them in their final show on the Stauffacher stage.

“Eric has us breaking the fourth wall almost constantly,” said DeHart, who plans to major in theater at Drury University in Springfield next fall. “And Lockstock (Caleb Shook, of Urbana), who is the narrator, is always talking straight to the audience, and it’s a constant circle of ‘We’re in a musical right now and we’re very aware of it.’ And it’s smart in that way, because not a lot of musicals are like that.”

“I play one character (Hope Cladwell, the beautiful daughter of a water baron), and she is rich and ditzy. We do play stereotypes,” said Teryn Snow, of Tunas, who hopes to become a theater instructor someday. “But also there is that point in some of the characters where you have to find something to connect to. So you’re sort of playing two styles: You have to connect with the character but at the same time you have to break that fourth wall. You have to look at the audience and talk to the audience, and I think it’s a real challenge. Some people might say that’s not real acting, but really it is. And it’s a bigger challenge, I think.”

Still, Snow is happy she doesn’t have to play four different characters like she did in February’s vignette-driven “Dining Room.”

“I am very happy with my one character,” she said with a laugh.

Zach Malott, of Pilot Grove, who plays Officer Barrel, likes the fact that every SFCC show is different from the one before — he’s glad to move from “The Dining Room” to the bathroom, as it were.

“We get to push ourselves, and it’s a good learning experience,” said Malott, who plans to minor in theater at Missouri State University in Springfield next fall.

After honing their acting chops in shows like “The Dining Room” and “Dearly Beloved,” DeHart, Snow and Malott aim to show they are whizzes at belting out musical numbers, too. “Urinetown” features 20 songs, so Yazell brought in Kevin Holbert, an adjunct music arts instructor at SFCC, to serve as music director and make sure the actors would make a splash as singers.

“We work together; we have to,” Yazell said. “The one sin you can’t have in a musical is people who can’t sing. We’re lucky that we have a good combination of both — actors who are good singers and singers who are good actors.”

Yes, the title is odd, and yes, there is at least one song about urinating — “It’s a Privilege to Pee,” sung impressively with a straight face by Miriam Parman, of Harrisonville. And it does bring up serious ideas about politics and overpopulation. But mostly, “Urinetown” is fun for people who love musicals, and maybe even more fun for people who find the clichés of musicals to be kind of silly.

Holbert, for one, has enjoyed the entire experience of bringing “Urinetown” to life, and he hopes theater fans will overcome any skittishness they have about the title.

“It’s been a hoot,” he said. “I just hope people will look at it as the educational experience that it is with the kids, and come and have fun with them.”

As news of the show has leaked around the campus and community, the buzz has generally been positive, aside from that one group of seniors. However, no one can be sure about the reception until the actual performances, when the “Urinetown” cast and crew makes its first real go at transferring the fun to the audience.

If it works, everyone will be relieved.