Spelling Bee kicks off with Gala on Friday

TCR – Kids are heading back to school this fall – and so is Theatre Cedar Rapids.

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee will be in session on the TCR stage September 10 through October 2. The Tony Award-winning musical comedy will also be the featured presentation at the theater’s season-kickoff Gala September 10.

“It’s always a good thing to start a season with lots of laughs, and this show couldn’t be more fun,” says director Leslie Charipar.

With music and lyrics by William Finn and book by Rachel Sheinkin, “Putnam County Spelling Bee” focuses on six awkward middle-school students who’ve made the final round of the local spelling bee. Along with spelling their words, the students are struggling with the pitfalls of middle school, from peanut allergies to puberty.

“There’s something really universal about going back in time and exploring your middle school years,” Charipar says. “This show takes middle school archetypes and puts them onstage, knowing what we know now.”

Among the competitors are Chip Tolentino (played by Nathan Scheetz), the returning champion, whose focus is affected by the onset of puberty; William Barfee (Alex Schulte), hoping to use his “magic foot” to avenge last year’s elimination over a peanut allergy; Leaf Coneybear (Ryan Foizey), a hippie child who makes his own clothes and sings that “I’m not that smart”; Marcy Park (Sarah Levy), an overachiever whose family doesn’t allow her to cry; Olive Ostrovsky (Elizabeth Simon), who’s actually made friends with her dictionary; and Logainne SchwartzandGrubierre (Laura Tatar), who speaks with a lisp and is the head of her elementary school’s Gay-Straight Alliance.

Adding to the humor is the choice to have adults play the six middle school competitors.

“In order to enjoy this play, you have to be well beyond your middle school years,” Charipar says. “When you’re in middle school, your problems are the worst problems in the world; if we tried to do that by casting kids who are still going through it, it wouldn’t be funny. It would be tragic. So this is a chance to laugh at how extreme we all were at that age, and you can only laugh at it because you’ve lived through it.”

That’s not to say that the kids in “Putnam County” are the only oddball characters. The event is presided over by Rona Lisa Peretti (Dyanna Dawn Davidson), the longtime bee hostess who keeps flashing back to her own victory; Vice Principal Douglas Panch (Mike Wilhelm), who has anger management issues and grows increasingly impatient with the kids; and Mitch Mahoney (Justin Braden), a convict who is doing his community service as the spelling bee’s “comfort counselor.”

Putnam County Spelling Bee opened on Broadway in 2005 and played for more than 1,000 performances. It was nominated for multiple Tony Awards including Best Musical, and it won two (Best Book and Best Featured Actor). Since then, it’s become popular at regional and community theatres, and all the recommendations got Charipar’s attention.

“It fits that model that we like to do for the first show of the season,” she said. “So I read it, and I laughed out loud as I was reading.”

Joining Charipar on the artistic team is Assistant Director Nick Williams and Music Director Janelle Lauer, as well as Technical Director Derek Easton. The three-piece orchestra consists of Tony Nickle, Ben Schmidt and Ryan Hoagland, while the set features a gymnasium, with the contestants sitting on bleachers and a basketball hoop hanging from the ceiling.

“One of the things Derek and I came up with is making sure that the athletics were this looming presence, because what we remember about being in school is that if you weren’t an athlete, then the focus wasn’t on you,” Charipar says. “So the basketball court is featured prominently, and anything that isn’t athletics is kind of wedged in between.”

“Spelling Bee” features a unique “audience participation” element: At every performance, several audience members are chosen before the show to join the six students as finalists in the spelling bee. Their success or failure in the bee tests the improvisational skills of the cast, leading to hilarious and unpredictable moments.

The artistic team stresses that while “Putnam County” is good-natured and funny, some of the jokes aren’t appropriate for children. Also, as Charipar notes, the subject matter might hit too close to home for kids who are actually going through some of the trials depicted onstage.

“We’re poking fun at stuff that’s really frank and brutal about being in middle school,” Charipar says. “It’s all true, and we’ve all been there – but maybe some parents aren’t ready to have that conversation yet.”

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee will be performed at the Season Kickoff Gala Friday, September 10, as a fundraiser for Theatre Cedar Rapids. The special night will feature auctions, prizes and catering. The show runs through Oct 2, with shows at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and at 2:30 p.m. Sundays. For tickets, call (319) 366-8591, visit the box office at 102 Third St. SE or go online at www.theatrecr.org.