SNAP! Productions - New Brain Extra


		*Reviews and More!*
		SNAP! Productions presents A NEW BRAIN Nov 17, 2005 - Dec 11, 2005
		*REVIEWS & Photos* See Photos
	Omaha World-Herald - November 19, 2005 A musical about dying reveals zest for living By BOB FISCHBACH WORLD-HERALD STAFFWRITER What do you do when faced with the specter of a possibly inoperable brain tumor? If you are composer William Finn, you turn the ordeal into a musical celebrating the joy of living. Finn, known for the Tony-winning "Falsettos" and "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee," didn't win as many accolades for "A New Brain," a 1998 off-Broadway show that unfolds in a nonstop 90 minutes of song and dance. But an engaging SNAP! cast of 12 attacks the material with verve, and several individual performances are simply irresistible. Finn turns facing death into a surprisingly hilarious, but only occasionally moving, experience. The show's central character, Gordon, is a struggling composer stuck writing songs for Mr. Bungee, egotistical star of a children's TV show. But over lunch with best pal Rhoda, Gordon collapses into a plate of pasta. Thus begins a long hospital ordeal, in which Gordon drifts between hallucination and unbearable reality, surrounded by his lover, his Jewish mother, Rhoda and the hospital staff. Oh, and Mr. Bungee, who in Gordon's plagued brain morphs into a pesky frog dispensing cynicism and an occasional bit of wisdom. Michal Simpson prances, glances, snaps and snarls his way through the Mr. Bungee role in his best performance in recent memory. He tortures Gordon equally in amphibian and human forms, whether de-manding that a song be finished the night before Gordon's brain surgery, or hovering bedside hounding him out of a coma. Equally outstanding is Stacie Lamb as a bag lady, insisting amid the forced optimism all around her that life doesn’t get any better. In his Omaha debut, Lenny Houts makes a thoroughly lik-able Gordon, someone the audi-ence wants to pull for. Terry DeBenedictis is spot-on as Gordon's mother. From the clearly enunciated patter lyrics of "Mother's Gonna Make Things Fine" to the surgery-eve fear and rage of "Throw It Out" to a tender ballad, "The Music Still Plays On," DeBenedictis defines maternal instinct. Wonderful snatches of character comedy come from Dan Wach as the egotistical brain surgeon, Jennifer Gilg as a ditzy waitress and a brusque nurse, and Derrick Crawford, as "the nice nurse," who browses Oprah's magazine between sponge baths. Roderick Cotton, as Roger, and Amanda Miller, as Rhoda, also have some fine moments. But what puts the show a cut above. is director Roxanne Wach's staging of ensemble numbers. Whether doo-wop or gospel, rocking out or tongue-in-cheek, big chorus numbers hit home with finely honed funny bits and layered harmonies, along with sharply executed choreography appropriately scaled to the tiny playing space. As a small musical, it's not the most deeply moving, not the most flawlessly sung. But "A New Brain" just plain entertains with its combination of comedy, character and zest for life.
	the City Weekly - November 23-29, 2005 Mr. Bungee’s Revenge Amphibian angst in ‘A New Brain’ at the Shelterbelt By David Williams Two wonderful actors who are new to local stages shine in the musical comedy “A New Brain,” an absolutely queer-larious SNAP! Productions show now running at the Shelterbelt Theatre. Lenny Houts, a recent arrival from Des Moines who owns a beautiful voice, stars in the role of Gordon in William Finn’s semi-autobiographical tale of a songwriter who fears that he is wasting his talent as he composes ditties for a kiddie’s television program. Worse yet, he must write songs for the show’s vapid frog character, Mr. Bungee. A brain injury that leaves him face down in his lunch interrupts both his job and his love life as his partner, Roger, stands helplessly beside a hospital bed as Gordon opines “I need a new brain.” Houts had been cast in the role of Roger in a Des Moines production of this same show when he learned of his transfer to Omaha and was forced to abandon the effort just after rehearsals began. “I’ll be thrilled if I can get the role of Roger,” Houts recalls thinking of his hopes when he auditioned for this Shelterbelt production, his first foray into acting since moving to Omaha. “Instead, they called me after auditions and offered me the role of Gordon. I was just speechless,” he says. The effervescent Amanda Miller, in only her second Omaha show since moving from Elgin, Neb. (Pop. 810 if you believe the sign on the north end of town and home to a mere 730 souls if you heed the sign that greets travelers from the south), plays the role of Rhoda, Gordon’s agent, who is clearly in love with her handsome, yet unattainably gay friend (“Next of kin? I wish!” she laments when quizzed by a nurse). As you may have seen in her recent debut in “Jon & Jen” at the Shelterbelt, the bubbly Ms. Miller can do more with a sultry wink or a rambunctious shimmy than most actors can do with an entire soliloquy. The cleverly costumed Michal Simpson is simply over the top as the audacious amphibian apparition, Mr. Bungee, who haunts Gordon throughout the evening. In a role that makes Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka seem almost cuddly, the cane-wielding Simpson cavorts creepily about the stage as a most unwelcome muse to the downcast Gordon. Just try to take your eyes off of him as he wheedles his way into Gordon’s head to take up residence in what is already, as DEVO once put it, a swelling, itchy brain. The sweet voiced Roderick Cotton as Roger, the comedic talents of Terry Benedictis as Gordon’s very Jewish mother who uses housecleaning as therapy (“Throw it Out,” she sings), and the riotous Stacie Lamb as an ever-present bag lady who manages to elbow her way into almost every scene all contribute to a great cast. The postage-stamp stage of the Shelterbelt plays like Radio City Music Hall as dancers seem to carom off the walls of this tiny space in marvelous dance numbers accompanied by Rod Carlson’s vibrant house band that handles with ease everything from the cha-cha-cha’s of the “Brain Dead” tango to the show-stopping “Gordo’s Law of Genetics.” “A New Brain” is a snappy 90-minute whirlwind of song and dance that “speaks to the healing power of the arts,” says director Roxanne Wach. Previous reviews on this page have lamented the recent exodus of Omaha talent, most notably Don Nguyen’s move to New York and Aaron Wilhoft’s planned move to London. For those of you who wonder where the next wave of dazzlers will emerge, head down to the Shelterbelt to be introduced to Lenny Houts and Amanda Miller.

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