The Addams Family Musical

What’s Great About Chicago? Pre-Broadway Shows!

I do have to admit that one of my favorite parts about Chicago is how often we have pre-Broadway musicals and plays tested here. While I’ve been a bit lax in the past year on getting to the theater, when ‘horror’ meets comedy on the stage I just couldn’t help but attend. Due to unforeseen circumstances, my original guest for the show had to be replaced at the last minute. Fortunately though I was able to find arm candy on short notice with the ever horror loving BJ-C of Day of the Woman. With attendance problems solved I was able to get there with no hitches on enjoying the show.

While I will pre-face this by saying it wasn’t the ‘best’ musical or play I have seen- that does not make it bad though. It was very entertaining and I had a great time. (I suppose with the last one’s I’ve seen being Wicked and Spamalot I kind of have higher expectations right now.) Still it was fun and to start with the “Grandmother” completely stole every scene she was in. Her lines had the most comedic impact and had me laughing nearly every time. For the most part they did keep true to The Addams Family tradition in the view of being in a horror setting and having a huge focus on family and love. The amount of sexual innuendos that were added in was a huge increase over what had been done with the family in the past but fit perfectly. For those who are planning on seeing it, the musical did tend to lean more towards the comics then the TV series and films but there were tributes to everything found within.

I did have two main complaints. The first of which is that sadly Nathan Lane as Gomez didn’t happen. His understudy Merwin Foard took the spot. This wasn’t really sad say performance wise as Merwin did an absolutely amazing job I just kind of wanted to see Nathan Lane pull off a Broadway performance. (Fun fact: He actually had a role in The Addams Family Values movie from ’93, funny how that works out.) So while that was a complaint only in the form that I wanted to see him there- Merwin Foard really did an amazing job and I have to say I had no issues there at all. Now onto Morticia- Bebe Neuwith had both the look and voice down, I just wasn’t sure I agreed with how she sang her parts. I sadly don’t know the proper phrasing as I am not so much of a musical junkie to be able to express it here but it just didn’t work for me. About half of it fit perfectly, the other half just didn’t sound right to me. Of course expectations can ruin what you see and hear if you were thinking it’d be different. Outside of this everyone else hit their roles spot on.

The set was a fun mix of the house, the surrounding woods, and various monsters that also dwell within- including the giant squid. Actually I was very impressed with how they did the tentacles to the giant squid in her most memorable of scenes near the end. Another part of the set that stuck out was when a monster took Pugsley’s bed off scene, while they set was being changed. There were a LOT of throwbacks to the show that were in visuals and not directly mentioned- from Thing to Cousin Itt as well as Morticia’s over sized rodent eating plant. Not quite the man eating plant it is in the series it is still used effectively when she is making a point to Wednesday. Speaking of Wednesday her role of playing having mixed feeling on her usual morbid lifestyle when it meets love with someone who by all means is normal is amazingly well done. Oh, and of course Fester’s lightbulb trick makes an appearance as well.

I really did have a good time watching this. As I mentioned previously my expectations for a pre-Broadway play were a bit higher then this could fill but it IS a good musical, it IS enjoyable to watch, and if you enjoy the world of The Addams Family, a well put together show, and a little dark and innuendo filled humor you should love this one.

Tagged as: Broadway, Chicago, Musical, The Addams Family