[NEohioPAL] Review of "Willie Wonka" at CVLT

[Bob Abelman]

Willy Wonka at CVLT boasts sweet, sour tastes 

 

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics 

 

This review appeared in the News-Herald 11/27/09

 

Willy Wonka, currently in production at the Chagrin Valley Little Theatre, is an odd and disturbing musical.

A stage adaptation of Roald Dahl's popular children's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,  it tells the tale of impoverished Charlie Bucket-one of five children to win a contest to tour London's famous chocolate factory-who ends up winning over the factory's owner, Willy Wonka. 

Because the story takes place in a fantasy world filled with unimaginable and edible treats, and its core message is that honesty is the best policy, it can be tempting to overlook just how dark, foreboding and cruel Dahl's writing actually is.  However, it is impossible to ignore it altogether.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a cautionary tale that depicts the horrors encountered by the bad children on the tour. Augustus, who is gluttonous, is swallowed by a river of chocolate.  Greedy Veruca is discarded as trash.  Sloth-like Mike is rendered small and insignificant.  The obsessive-compulsive Violet becomes the product of her compulsion.  

 

Wonka himself is a maniacal, manipulative man-child.  He is singularly responsible for Charlie's suffering by having laid off Charlie's father and replacing the local workforce with foreigners-the Oompa-Loompas.  Wonka manufactures exotic sweets just down the road from where Charlie's destitute family barely survives on cabbage soup.

 

This is unsettling stuff.

The 1971 film was a candy-coated adaptation of the book.  It introduced fluffy musical numbers by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, with lyrics like "who can take a rainbow, wrap it in a sigh, soak it in the sun and make a groovy lemon pie."  It cast lovable Gene Wilder as Wonka, who turned maniacal into mischievous.  It employed brightly spray-painted midgets to play Oompa-Loompas.

Still, the film could not completely overcome Dahl's darkness, mask Wonka's creepiness or shake the book's disturbing imagery (in fact, the spray-painted midgets called attention to it).  Neither can the play, although it works doubly hard to do so.

Willy Wonka includes all the inane tunes rejected by the film, eliminates the heavy back-story about corporate espionage, and makes Wonka less mysterious by having him narrate the story.  The result is a sugar-dipped sourball of a show; a yummy confection with an acidic aftertaste.  

To its credit, the CVLT production under the direction of Julia Kolibab accentuates all that is fun and fantastic in the story.  It does so on several fronts.

 

As with You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, adults are intended to play the children in Willy Wonka.  With children playing the children in this production, the cuteness quotient significantly increases as does the show's family-friendliness.

 

Having extraordinarily talented children makes this production a particular delight.  Mark Oet, as Charlie, lacks the necessary kid-in-a-candy-store awe, but his sweet tenor turns every asinine song into something wonderful.  As the self-destructive children on tour, Kal Bowers, Ashleigh Nagy, Liam Garnaut and Anna Gottfried are a joy to watch.  

 

The nine girls that play the Oompa-Loompas steal the show during their short but frequent stints on stage.  They execute Bill Wade and Elizabeth Pollert's very silly and stylized choreography to perfection and are adorable.

 

Charlie's grandparents, played by Don Edelman (now on injured reserve), Sy Levine, Patty Osredkar and Cindee Catalano-Edelman, are wonderful comic relief.  The children's parents are also quite good, with Tonya McCulley as Charlie's mom turning in a particularly fine performance.

 

Don Bernardo exorcises the creepiness from Wonka, which is no small feat, but he does not replace it with anything particularly interesting or distinctive.  His Wonka is fine, but it lacks that certain something.

 

Creating a chocolate factory that, according to the lyrics, is "a place of pure imagination" must be a nightmare on a community theater's budget.  Technical director Edmond Wolff exceeds expectations by creating a projected video display that establishes location and creates a sense of magic in lieu of genuine theatrical bells and whistles.  

 

Yes, Willy Wonka is an odd musical.  But the CVLT makes it a very palatable entertainment for the family.

 

Willy Wonka continues through December 19 at the Chagrin Valley Little Theatre, 56 River Street, Chagrin Falls.  For tickets, which are $18 and $14, call 440-247-8955 or visit www.cvlt.org.

 

 
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