<p style="MARGIN: auto 0in" class="topstorytitle"><font color="#ff0000" size="6" face="Times New Roman">‘Guys on Ice’ isn’t typical fishing-hole drama</font></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 12pt" class="MsoNormal"><em><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By David Ritchey</font></em></p>
<h3 style="MARGIN: auto 0in"><font face="Times New Roman"><em><span>Actors’ Summit show features fine acting</span></em><span></span></font></h3>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="4">HUDSON — “Guys on Ice” isn’t a production of the ice follies with an all male cast. </font></font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Now playing at Actors’ Summit Theater through Dec. 30, “Guys on Ice” is about three guys who ice fish on a lake near Sturgeon Bay, Wis. This show is a crowd-pleaser. I’ve not seen that many people smile and laugh since I saw “The Producers.” “Guys on Ice” quickly reminds one of TV shows like “Hee-Haw,” “Green Acres” and, perhaps, “The Lawrence Welk Show.” The jokes and stories are “down home” and corny. </font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The plot deals with good buddies Lloyd (Frank Jackman) and Marvin (Dana Hart). They seem to share everything. Marvin has made contact with a sports reporter, who plans to do a TV story about ice fishing. The reporter is intrigued with Marvin and the little wooden hut he has as his home on the ice. Marvin invites his best buddy Lloyd to join him in the hut and, perhaps, on the TV show. They fish, tell corny jokes, sing a few songs and deal with Ernie (Shawn Galligan), a well-known moocher.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Lloyd is married and has marital problems. His wife has left him and moved in with her parents. The problem is Lloyd’s wedding anniversary is the same day as the next game of the Green Bay Packers, for which he has two tickets. What’s the problem? He and his wife will have another anniversary next year.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Marvin is in lust or like with a woman at a local store. She has a tattoo in a spot that Marvin is anxious to see. If he could just get a couple of tickets for the Packers game, he might move this romance along.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The show was written by James Kaplan (music) and Fred Alley (book and lyrics). Kaplan’s music is not memorable, and Alley’s lyrics are, for the most part, tied to ice fishing in Wisconsin. The songs include “De Guy from Tee Vee,” which is a love song to the TV reporter who might do a story about Marvin’s ice fishing hut. “De Snowmobile Suit” focuses on the snowsuits the men wear when ice fishing.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The most interesting song was Marvin’s singing of “De Ice Fishing King.” This is a gentle take off Elvis Presley (imagine a snowsuit-clad Elvis Presley ice fishing and singing).</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Ernie, the moocher, does “The Guys on Ice Half Time Show.” Ernie asks the audience questions, and the first person to raise his or her hand and yell out “OK” will be called on to answer the question. The prizes include a dill pickle, a piece of beef jerky and a bottle of beer. (You understand what I meant when I wrote this was a down-home evening in the theater.)</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The performers play these roles well. Hart has long been a favorite at Actors’ Summit. He helps rescue the script by making the jokes almost fresh.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jackman sings well and brings his good-ole-boy style to this production.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Galligan hones an over-the-top energy in the Ernie role.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Director MaryJo Alexander keeps the action moving at a rapid pace. She also was responsible for the appropriate costumes. She had an advantage with these costumes, as the temperature in Summit County plunged so low that audience members were willing to be costumed in snowsuits, too.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Neil Thackaberry (set and lighting) created a hut-on-the-ice that opened to reveal the inside of the hut and fill the playing area of the Summit Theater.</font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">For tickets, call (330) 342-0800.</font></p>
<p><em><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">David Ritchey has a Ph.D. in communications and is a professor of communications at The University of Akron. He is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association.</font></em></p>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4"></font></span> </div>
<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4">Review of <i>Guys On Ice </i>at Actors Summit in Hudson</font></span></div>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4">for WJCU-FM (88.7 FM) & <a href="http://wjcu.org">wjcu.org</a>.</font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4">Written and recorded for airplay by Fred Dolan</font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4"> </font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Neil Thackaberry of Actors’ Summit in nearby Hudson has a real knack for finding entertaining scripts that I have never heard of like last season’s <i>Big Boys </i>and <i>Don’t Hug Me.</i> Well, this year he may have outdone himself with <i>Guys On Ice, The Ice Fishing Musical,</i> where Marvin & Lloyd spend a day out on the ice in a shanty in upper Wisconsin on a typical below zero day, waiting for a local fishing show host to interview them for his TV show and make Marvin a local celebrity.</font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><font size="4"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Like </span><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Vladimir and Estragon, caught in an ice-bound version of <i>Waiting For Godot</i>, Marvin & Lloyd entertain themselves while they are waiting with corny jokes, personal reflections, their problems and ambitions, and plenty of entertaining songs about fish & fishing, life out on the ice, their snowmobile suits, and drinking beer. </span></font></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Marvin wants to be a TV star so he can impress Bonnie, a cashier at the local Pick-N-Save, so she’ll go out with him. </font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoBodyText"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Lloyd has his own problems. His wife just moved out because Lloyd wants to spend their upcoming wedding anniversary at the next Packers’ game.</font></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As Marvin and Lloyd, Dana Hart & Frank Jackman are very entertaining portraying these simple souls in rural Wisconsin who love nothing more than being out on the ice with a bucket of Leininkugel beer, talking about the Packers. Both of them also have very good voices for the musical numbers and totally embrace the off-beat wackiness of the show. In addition, Shawn Galligan is properly annoying as Ernie the Moocher, an unwelcome guest at the ice shanty.</font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><i>Guys On Ice</i> is not your typical holiday show, but who cares. It’s a very entertaining comic evening at the theater with terrific performances, witty songs, and lots of “you betcha” dialect laughs.</font></span></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><font size="4"><i><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Guy On Ice</span></i><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> runs thru December 30 at Actors’ Summit in beautiful Hudson. For more information visit <a href="http://actorssummit.org">actorssummit.org</a>.</span></font></p>
<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNormal"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><font size="4"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Happy Holidays at the theater.</font></span></p>