Coming up in TGIF: ‘Avenue Q’ at MVT
BY STEVEN MARK / smark@staradvertiser.com
The neighborhood is pleasant, unassuming, somewhat shabby and immediately seems familiar when a man emerges and greets a puppet that looks strangely like a Muppet.
As one might expect, a cheerful tune emerges, but it’s a bit strange:
“A perfect morning for a kid to play — but you’ve got lots bills to pay.”
It’s the first clue that not all is OK on “Avenue Q,” the savagely satirical sendup of “Sesame Street” premiering Thursday at Manoa Valley Theatre. The Tony Award-winning musical is both an R-rated trip down memory lane for mature fans of the iconic children’s show and a shocking but hilarious commentary on youth, dreams and life.
“I know tons of kids, how ‘Sesame Street’ has affected their growing up and their lives,” said director Bree Buma tai, “and even though ‘Avenue Q’ takes it to task and there’s a lot of humor about it, to me it sort of honors that whole thing by making fun of it.”
“Avenue Q” takes plenty of liberties with the “Sesame Street” ethos, with songs about Internet pornography, tolerating racism (as opposed to racial tolerance) and laughing at others’ misfortunes, among others.
But if it seems seditious to use seemingly child-friendly, talking, singing big-eyed puppets to poke fun at the ills of society, “Avenue Q” goes even further. Defying most conventions of puppetry, and especially the “Sesame Street” style, the human puppeteers are fully visible onstage, acting as well as puppeteering.
Viewers inevitably find themselves drawn back and forth between humans and puppets, enjoying the acting, admiring the puppetry or both. It’s multitasking amusement.
BUMATAI, who has experience in puppetry, saw the show on Broadway a few years ago and was surprised, then amused by the effect.
“I thought that was really cool, because usually you never see the puppeteer,” she said. “But I think it’s totally appropriate, and what you’re supposed to do is watch the puppeteer and the actor.”
The show sent ripples of excitement through Hono lulu’s theater community, with actors eager to try their hand at puppetry.
Most of the cast had little or no puppetry experience before a pre-audition introductory workshop with master puppeteer Pam Arci ero, a Hawaii native who has worked on “Sesame Street” for more than 20 years.
Arciero instructed auditioners in some tricks of the trade, such as practicing before a mirror, lip-synching and using pingpong balls suspended on elastic bands to practice. The puppets in the show are rented and used only in rehearsal and performance. MVT even has a puppet doctor, Anna Viggiano, on hand in case one is “hurt.”
Once the cast was selected, Buma tai had some simple advice for them:
“I told them from day one that although these are puppets — their little ‘mini-me’s’ — the characters still have to ring true,” she said. “You have to care about them.”
“Avenue Q” is a coming-of-age story about a recent college graduate, Princeton, whose youthful desire to change the world runs into the harsher realities of life. His new friends in the run-down neighborhood of Avenue Q — an unemployed comic, his underemployed fiancee, a closeted banker, a frustrated young teacher — have their own dashed dreams. Their building superintendent is actor Gary Coleman, the epitome of the washed-up wonder child.
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Pick up a copy of TGIF in Friday’s Honolulu Star-Advertiser to read the rest of this story.
‘Avenue Q’
Presented by Manoa Valley Theatre
» Where: Manoa Valley Theatre, 2833 E. Manoa Rd.
» When: 7:30 p.m. Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays, 3 and 8 p.m. Saturdays and 4 p.m. Sundays from March 3 through March 20
» Cost: $20 to $35
» Info: 988-6131 or www.manoa valley theatre.com
» Note: MVT recommends ages 14 and up; the show addresses issues like sex, drinking and pornography on the Internet (children under 14 must be accompanied by parent or guardian)
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