by Alec Clayton
Performances of Theater Artists Olympia’s The HEAD That Wouldn’t DIE! at Lakewood Playhouse take place only one more weekend. After that, if you want to see it, and you should, your next chance will be at the World Science Fiction Convention in Seattle in August. After that — who knows? The Head (the musical) seems to have a life expectancy like that of the head in the play. This is the third time TAO has produced it in our area, first in 2014 and again in 2015. New songs have been added, and many of the cast and crew from those productions are in this one.
The play is a takeoff on one of the worst B movies ever, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, with additional dialogue and lyrics by the TAO collective. It is two hours of insanity, not recommended for children younger than 13 according to a warning posted in the theater and not recommended for people who don’t get satire according to this reviewer.
So what is The Head? It is two hours of camp, two hours of a Saturday Night Live skit, two hours of Monty Python, and two hours of The Rocky Horror Picture Show all rolled into one. It’s a tongue-in-cheek sci-fi fantasy with catchy tunes and a chorus of doctors and nurses in white lab coats.
In a series of gorgeous evening gowns, Heather Christopher introduces each act with comical seriousness such as after intermission when she tells the audience that what’s to come enters a dimension “between satire and schlock.” That could serve as a description of the entire play.
Disgustingly smart and rich and proud of it, Dr. Corman Cortner (John Charters) and his equally rich and smart son Bill (Xander Layden) could be stand-ins for Fred and Donald Trump.
Bill accidentally kills his girlfriend, Jan (Leslie Gordon) after she begs him to slow down on Dead Man’s Curve, but he saves her head and keeps it alive in a pan on a kind of Frankenstein medical cabinet, giving birth to the name Jan in the Pan. He blames her for the accident and has no regrets.
Jan’s head is watched over by Kurt (Gabriel McClelland) who is a medically deformed guinea pig for Dr. Bill’s experiments. And there is something scary hidden in the closet (also John Charters).
Having discovered how to save a head, now Bill wants to find the perfect body to attach Jan’s head to. So he attends Argento’s Body Beautiful Pageant in a scene that is a takedown of beauty pageants in particular and misogyny in general. There, Bill reconnects with his former girlfriend Doris (Victoria Austin) who wants nothing to do with him.
The acting under the direction of Pug Bujeaud is excellent throughout, as are the music (musical director Sarah Elliott) and the sets and props (BC2020, Ethan Bujeaud, Tim and Debbie Sampson).
Particularly outstanding are Charters and Layden as Doctors Cortner, Charters again as the thing in the closet, McClelland as Kurt, Christopher as the hostess, and Gordon as Jan in the Pan.
Recommended, but not for the squeamish.
Photos by TAO.
WHAT:
The HEAD That Wouldn’t DIE!
WHEN:
7:30 p.m. April 10-12 and 2 p.m. April 13
WHERE:
Lakewood Playhouse, 5729 Lakewood Towne Center Blvd SW
HOW MUCH:
$25, April 10th “Pay What You Can”
LEARN MORE:
https://www.olytheater.com/
info@olytheater.com