Special Sections - WHIDBEY XTRA Dec 9 2015

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Whidbey Xtra! WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2015 | Vol. 1, No. 32 | WWW.WHIDBEYNEWSTIMES.COM | FREE

Playhouse offering a twist on Dickens’ Christmas Carol By RON NEWBERRY

rnewberry@whidbeynewsgroup.com

As if the action onstage wasn’t frantic enough, the chaos behind the scenes might’ve had it beat. Andrew Huggins wriggled through a narrow corridor headed in one direction while Heather Good squeezed past him going the other way. Some actors popped in backstage to grab a cap or wig, while others slipped into a new dress or jacket. The costume changes must take place in seconds to keep up with the frenzied production. “The pace is crazy, to say the least,” Good said. All this chaos was part of a recent rehearsal for an off-season play is being performed at the Whidbey Playhouse in December. “A Dickens’ Christmas Carol: A Traveling Travesty in Two Tumultuous Acts” is intentionally out of control. It’s part of the comedy centered around a traveling theater company bringing to the stage one of the holiday season’s favorite stories only to watch it come apart at the seams. “The conceit of the show is they are all actors playing characters playing actors playing characters,” said

Ron Newberry photo

Jim Reynolds plays Scrooge in a holiday play at the Whidbey Playhouse this month. ‘A Dickens’ Christmas Carol: A Traveling Travesty in Two Tulmutuous Acts’ plays through Dec. 20. Kevin Wm Meyer, who codirects the play with Julia Locke. “It’s a play within a play,” Locke said. Things go haywire when the company’s diva, who earlier feigns illness hoping the show will be canceled, decides to return mid-performance and upstage her young understudy after the show had gone on without her. That’s mostly when chaos ensues, sending actors

scrambling into strange and foreign roles on the fly to try to keep the show from total collapse. “The show’s all about improv,” Locke said. “It’s a really fun show. “And because the show features actors doing many different roles, it’s constant (costume) changes, so we have a big crew backstage helping people pull things off and put things back on, which makes it really fun and crazy.”

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Huggins gets the worst of it. In his acting debut at the Whidbey Playhouse, Huggins switches into nine characters involving 18 wardrobe changes. Fellow actor Thomas Clatterbuck isn’t far behind. “I’m over here as one character,” Huggins said. “I run back here and come out as another character and go back over there as the first character and come back here as the other character then go back.”

“Exactly,” Clatterbuck interjected. “The character on this side has an English accent,” Huggins continued. “The character on the other side has a Scottish accent, so I’ve got to know what I’m doing and what costume I’m in to make sure I get the right one.” The hilarity is squeezed into about 90 minutes, giving the audience a kick-start to the Christmas season and following the playhouse’s 50th anniversary theme this season of providing shows that been performed there in the past. About eight dressers and other crew backstage help to make sure costume changes go as quickly and seamless as possible while stage manager Julie McNutt keeps her fingers crossed. When they don’t, the actors are empowered with the freedom to improvise. Admittedly having it easy by comparison is Jim Reynolds, who plays Sir Selsdon Piddock, who in turn plays Ebenezer Scrooge. Reynolds can focus on just one character, though it’s the key role the play revolves around. “I can pretty much get

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away with murder because everybody else is doing the hard work,” Reynolds said with a laugh. Reynolds is tackling his biggest role in his 11th show at the playhouse since retiring from the Navy. He said he loves playing the role of the “old crotchety, kind of spry” Scrooge. He had to become a quick study after spending several weeks recently overseas aboard an aircraft carrier. He still is a consultant for the Navy. The cast also includes Mary Waters, Tamara Sykes, Coqui Herken and Good, four actresses who’ve played significant roles in past productions in Oak Harbor. Clatterbuck is another face familiar to the playhouse. While the characters run wild grabbing wigs and garments, the set also is at times spinning. To quickly change the scenery onstage, three areas of the set are built on turntables. And there’s plenty of chaos onstage and off. “I have a problem with that crazy blond wig, getting it on so it doesn’t fall off,” Good said. “The pacing is just wild.”