Southport Magazine

What: Broadway’s Next Hit Musical
When: Friday, April 19th
Doors: 7 p.m. • Show: 7:30 p.m.
Where: Odell Williamson Auditorium
50 College Rd., Bolivia
Cost: $10-27
Info: (910) 755-7416
www.bccowa.com

Some would say the creativity coming out of Hollywood has fallen flat in recent years. Let’s be honest—audiences were subjected to a long list of remakes, spin-offs or follow-ups in 2012: “The Dark Knight Rises,” “The Avengers,” “Men in Black 3,” “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” “The Amazing Spider-Man” … And the sequels don’t stop there.

From front left, clockwise: Deb Rabbai, Rob Schiffmann, Kobi Libii, Greg Triggs, Robert Z. Grant, and Stefan Schick improv to create ‘Broadway’s Next Hit Musical.’ Courtesy photo

Movie screens didn’t showcase a whole lot of ingenuity last year, and it seems the theme for 2013 is fairy tales in film form. From “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” to “Jack the Giant Slayer,” scripts are being torn from the pages of storybooks rather than dreamt in the minds of artistic masters.

Broadway shows that took home Tony Awards last year mostly weren’t bred from original ideas, either. “Newsies,” though it won Best Original Score, is the stage adaptation of a popular Disney film. “Peter and the Starcatcher” is a take on Scottish playwright J.M. Barrie’s mischievous character Peter Pan—and it garnered five wins. The show which earned the most nods—at an astounding eight Tony Awards—was “Once,” yet another film-turned-musical.

Sometimes we the people seem to brew more inventive scenes than professional screenwriters and playwrights. As much will be proved true come Friday, April 19th, when a band of New York City actors will take over the stage of the Odell Williamson Auditorium for “Broadway’s Next Hit Musical.”

As folks usher in the doors, beginning at 7 p.m., they’ll be handed a program and a note card. On the card, they’ll need to write a suggestion for a song title from an imaginary musical.

What they’re sitting down to in the first act is an awards ceremony, like the Tonys—but these are the Phony Awards. Of all the song suggestions collected, the NYC performers will select four. Then, the audience will be treated to a hilarious improvisation of those four songs, each “nominees” for Best Musical.

The comedians, with all their energetic zest, will imagine each detail right there on the spot: the title of the musical from which the song came,  the characters, every lyric, and each facial expression. Even the piano player will improvise his key-tickling accompaniment.

“I’ve been involved in improvisation and comedy for over 20 years,” Greg Triggs, who acts as the host of the awards ceremony, explains. “This show is one of the smartest in which I’ve ever performed. The bar is very high because we have some of the best musical improvisers in the country in our cast.”

Actress Deb Rabbai and actor Rob Schiffmann, both co-directors of the show, along with Triggs and producing partner Ralph Buckley, started working on the show about three years ago. The brilliance lies in that no two shows are the same. Its success can be chalked up to the audiences’ creative titles and the cast’s quick wit.

“Improvisers are always looking for new ways to make an audience laugh,” Triggs continues. “There’s no one in the show who doesn’t really want to be there. We’re a company that loves to challenge each other, and the whole thing is built on respect.”

Though it’s impossible to rehearse a musical that doesn’t yet exist, the cast does polish its comedic timing from time to time. “Improvisation is a muscle that needs to be exercised,” Triggs says, allowing some insight to what goes on behind the scenes. “A rehearsal might be to review the structure of the show. It could also be about story technique, musical structure—or just making each other laugh!”

Triggs says he’s encountered many bizarre songs in the show’s past. “The audience really loves challenging us,” he notes. “Some of my favorites have included ‘I Hate Cats,’ ‘Me Llama,’ ‘Monkey Boy’ (We get a lot of animal titles, don’t we?), and ‘‘When You’re an Old Lady, The Cops Can’t Wait to Give You a Ticket.’”

Likewise, the characters imagined by the comedians run the gamut. “We’ve had angry zoo owners selling endangered species for food, llamas trapped in the middle of New York City, Abraham Lincoln long before Daniel Day-Lewis won the Oscar,” Triggs quips. “The show goes wherever the audience takes us, and we love the ride!”

Of course, of the four nominees, only one can take home the Phony Award for Best Musical. Thus, the champion song is selected by audience cheer after all four have been performed, and act two reveals the full performance of the winning musical. Again improvising, the actors will think up about five songs and connecting scenes to lay out the story. It will be Broadway’s next hit musical, and it all will be inspired by one guest’s wild imagination.