Bat Boy: The Musical
Griffin Theatre at The Den Theatre
Thru July 25
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Like a great friend, great art—or even just great entertainment—can make both the good times and bad times better.
This past Sunday morning, I woke up to hear the devastating news about the massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando. Although sad news is a daily occurrence, and mass shootings all too common, the slaughter of 49 people out for a night of dancing—with 53 more injured—is something no one with a heart & soul could easily shrug off.
So, glad to have been granted an invitation for the Press Opening, I arrived at the Den Theatre on Milwaukee Ave. with a good deal of melancholy mixed into my mindset, but smiled as soon as I saw the show curtain.
It essentially recreated the Weekly World News tabloid front page from 1992, with a headline and story about a BAT BOY FOUND IN WEST VIRGINIA CAVE.
This served to not only inform the uninitiated that this Bat Boy show had nothing to do with baseball or Batman, but to set the occasionally (but not overly) campy tone employed by the performers under the direction of Scott Weinstein.
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So while calling it campy may foster connotations that don’t do it qualitative justice, I like how the show, and particularly this rendition, never takes itself too seriously.
Henry McGinniss seems just about perfect in embodying the titular Bat Boy, who is christened Edgar after being taken in, then educated and gentrified, by a local family consisting of the local veterinarian Dr. Taylor (Matt Miles), his wife Meredith (Anne Sheridan Smith) and their teenage daughter, Shelley (Tiffany Tatreau).
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Perhaps prompted by budgetary and cast-size constraints—I don’t recall if it was previously done this way—I like how director Weinstein has a few of the actors (Jeff Meyer, Jordan Dell Harris, Ron King) occasionally donning wigs to play female townsfolk, while alternately embodying male characters.
King especially steals every scene he’s in, while the rest of the cast is also quite appealing, including Michael Kingston as the local Sheriff and Erin Daly as the Mayor and assorted others.
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I can’t say I ever forgot what had happened in Orlando as I was watching the show, but it’s a testament to caliber the material, performers and production that I was able to thoroughly enjoy it, nonetheless.
And while such a distressing real-life prism would likely have reflected on anything I may have seen that afternoon, I couldn’t help but appreciate considerable relevance and resonance in the Bat Boy’s initial ostracization for being different, and his touching struggle for acceptance amid a close-minded community.
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But there’s no reason why it shouldn’t. For even amid great darkness, Bat Boy: The Musical showed that it's quite something to be seen.
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