Vitriolic ‘Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You’ Still Pushes Buttons

Vitriolic ‘Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You’ Still Pushes Buttons

By Lynn Venhaus

A social satire is not fulfilling its goal if it doesn’t outrage somebody, and “Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You” is certainly provocative.

Stray Dog Theatre’s production pushes buttons, even though the show is now 43 years old. Wickedly funny, bold and acrimonious, the company wisely played it straight.

But you won’t find protesters outside Tower Grove Abbey. This time at least. Stray Dog Theatre isn’t a group that shies away from controversial subject matter and has presented bold and unconventional fare before. (For instance, this year alone, Charles Busch’s campy satire “Vampire Lesbians of Sodom” was the June show).

Christopher Durang’s watershed 1979 play takes aim at Roman Catholic dogma, and specifically, a rigid teaching nun for her over-reaching and unchecked abuse of power.

For his absurdist comedy, he mocked the nuns as authority figures. Apparently, he had a lot of anger from being raised Catholic. With identity and sexual disorientation being among his frequent themes, of course he channeled it all in this script.

As a graduate of Our Lady of Peace School in Providence, New Jersey, Durang no doubt stored material as he matriculated there, and went on to Harvard and Yale School of Drama. He also won the Obie Award for Best Playwright in 1980, at age 32, for this work. (Much later, he won a Tony for “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” in 2012).

“Sister Mary Ignatius” brought him to national prominence and raised the ire of St. Louis Catholics. If you think Billy Joel’s song “Only the Good Die Young” caused a ruckus in the St. Louis Archdiocese in 1977, well they went ballistic when the Theatre Project Company announced they would be presenting the black comedy in 1983. Thirty years ago, the archbishop condemned it, and protests ensued.

But these days, after years of clergy being unfavorably in the spotlight, and nuns as characters in both comedies and dramas, “Sister Mary Ignatius” isn’t the lightning rod it once was. And Catholics have other things more pressing to worry about – although being traumatized by a religious order should remain high on the list.

The one-act starts out with a conventional structure but then meltdowns begin. Sister Mary Ignatius, played with utmost conviction by Sarajane Clark, is still teaching children about the perils of sin and hellfire when several alumni – mostly hot messes — come for a visit. When she finds out how far these members of her flock have strayed from the path of righteousness, well let’s just say there are some shocking consequences.

Tables turn, and it isn’t pretty. Director Gary F. Bell stages it as an absurdist horror film.

Rachel Bailey is the emotionally wounded Diane Symonds, who threatens Sister’s life. Eileen Engel is Philomena, an unwed mother, Stephen Henley is Gary, polite and gay, with Sean Seifert as Aloysius, a troubled alcoholic. They’re all genuine on stage, veterans that they are.

Sister’s obedient little Thomas is played with poise by youngster Tommy Pepper, who misses the violence on stage.

Anyone who went to a parochial school will be reminded of catechism teachings and how rigid certain nuns were.

Sister Mary Ignatius is an extreme example, but there are nuggets of truth in this mischievous manifesto. The sharp satire makes for some uncomfortable and awkward moments, so folks are warned in case there would be triggers.

Stray Dog Theatre presents “Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You” for mature audiences Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m. Nov. 30 – Dec. 16. For tickets or for more information, visit www.straydogtheatre.org.

All photos by John Lamb

Spirited Cast Enlivens Goofy, Gutsy ‘Triassic Parq: The Musical’

Spirited Cast Enlivens Goofy, Gutsy ‘Triassic Parq: The Musical’

By Lynn Venhaus

Hold on to your pearls, for “Triassic Parq: The Musical” is a raunchy romp of an offbeat musical comedy.

A parody of the film and novel “Jurassic Park,” the blockbuster 1993 science-fiction action thriller by Steven Spielberg adapted from Michael Crichton’s 1990 bestseller, this is flipped for the dinosaurs’ point of view.

Talk about a chaos theory. Bedlam ensues when one of the genetically engineered female dinosaurs turns male – spontaneously. It’s not nice when you fool Mother Nature – but it sure is naughty.

Goofy and gutsy as can be, the Stray Dog production features a winning cast that gives it their all, in belting out power ballads and selling daffy up-tempo numbers, with light-hearted choreography by Mike Hodges. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cast work so hard with material that’s this absurd and thin.

Tristan Davis is the Velociraptor of Innocence, all swaggering rocker in “Get Out,’ while Michael Wells is the evangelist-like Velociraptor of Faith, reveling in the campiness of “Morning Assembly” and “Hello, Little Goat” – exhibiting strong, soaring vocals after not being on the stage since “Guys and Dolls” in the Before Times.

Laurell Stephenson is spirited in dual roles — as the skeptical Velociraptor of Science and then having fun interacting with the audience as a character named Morgan Freeman – that was actually played by the deep-voiced Oscar winner once upon a time. He/she disappears quickly after a hilarious set-up.

The fearless pair of punk rocker grrrls stand out as the Tyrannosaurus Rexes – a frisky Dawn Schmid as T-Rex 1/Kaitlyn and ballsy Rachel Bailey as the dial-it-to-11 confused T-Rex 2. They unleash their attraction in “Love Me As a Friend.”

The spunky ensemble accepts the wild-ride aspect and overcomes what the silly show lacks in sustainability.

This playful cast of six starts out with high energy in “Welcome to Triassic Parq” – and continues full-throttle to win over the eager crowd in 14 songs while dishing out a lot of sexual innuendo. It would seem like zany schoolkids’ antics were it not for the quality of the vocals – like a John Mulaney Broadway musical parody on “Saturday Night Live.”

Photos by John Lamb

But this is an actual musical that played off-Broadway in 2012 after winning best overall musical production at the 2010 New York International Fringe Festival. The music and lyrics are by Marshall Pailet, with co-lyricists Bryce Norbitz and Steve Wargo, and all three combined on the book.

Songs include lyrics about penises for shock value – “Dick Fix,” riffing on John Williams’ symphonic score “We Are Dinosaurs,” and outlandish “Mama.”

The band is led by Pianosaurus Leah Schultz (and music director0, with Adam Rugo the Guitaratops and Joe Winters the Drumadon.

Director Justin Been goes for the gusto, keeping things zippy and nonsensical, aiming to achieve a real crowd-pleaser, especially for a generation who grew up with the “Jurassic Park” movie trilogy and returned for the franchise offshoot “Jurassic World.”

The original won three tech Academy Awards, while the two even more preposterous sequels in 1997 and 2001 stretched the boundaries of logic, even for sci-fi/fantasy. A reboot called “Jurassic World” in 2015 was followed by a sequel in 2018, with the latest, “Dominion,” set to open June 10.

But in the one-act musical, performed without an intermission, you do not need that much familiarity with the 30-year-old source material, for the emphasis is on spoofing religion, sex, and identity. The prehistoric setting is purely for laughs.

Eileen Engel designed functional costumes with a touch of whimsy to convey the gender-bending.

Scenic designer Josh Smith worked magic in his scaled-down version of the Isla Nublar theme park on the Tower Grove Abbey stage, stunning without benefit of computer-generated imagery or visual effects.

The technical efforts add considerably to the overall presentation, including lighting by Tyler Duenow and outstanding sound work.

Stray Dog has always had a penchant for producing quirky plays –such as the “Evil Dead” musical, Charles Busch’s “Psycho Beach Party,” and “Red Scare on Sunset,” as a different direction between more serious explorations. So the strange, slight “Triassic Parq” is well-suited to be in between “Good People” and “The Normal Heart” this 2022 season.

Whether or not you are fascinated by dinosaurs is immaterial. This is not meant to be anything more than saucy merriment, so lower expectations and accept the vulgarity (or not – this is intended for “mature” adult audiences, as in rated R).

Stray Dog Theatre presents “Triassic Parq: The Musical” from April 15 through 30, with performances 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; with additional performances at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 24, and at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, April 27, at the Tower Grove Abbey, 2336 Tennessee Avenue. For more information or tickets, visit www.straydogtheatre.org.