DK+Spelling+Bee

Spelling Bee Pros 1. Singing—I really enjoyed most of the singing in Spelling Bee. The songs themselves were generally upbeat and funny, such as ‘Life is Pandemonium’ and the one about the untimely erection, or moving and sad, such as the song about the girl imagining that her mother and father both love her and care about her, and most of the singing was fairly well done. I did grow somewhat tired of the repeats of the good-bye song that was sung every time a contestant was eliminated, but apart from that, the songs were a great help in moving the storyline along and addressing material that might have been boring if it had simply been spoken. 2. Audience participation—Bringing audience members up to the stage and letting them participate in the spelling bee was very cool; it meant that each performance was unique and held a kind of element of surprise, because something could go wrong with these untrained, essentially improving people in the show. I wasn’t sure how much coaching the participants were given beforehand, if any, but it did seem as though they must have received at least some direction for what they should do and ask while on stage. They consistently asked for definitions of the words they were given to spell, even very simple words, for which the definitions were generally punch lines or jokes. It seemed as though they must have been prepped for the action, which made the entire thing seem a little forced and lessened the appeal of the whole idea of blind audience participation. 3. Relating to each character—The play did a very good job of making me sympathize with almost all of the characters, whether by letting them perform a sort of sung soliloquy that provided insight into their lives outside of the bee (such as Olive’s tear-jerker song about a scene where her parents loved her, which ended by reminding us that it was only imagined), or by simply showing us scenes from their home life, such as Leaf’s remembrance of his entire family putting him down as simply a “dumb kid”, or one of Logainne’s spelling practice sessions with her fathers, who argued with each other and harped on her to be perfect, blowing a sharp whistle every time she spelled a word incorrectly. I felt very bad for some of the characters and was therefore more invested in them and their performance in the bee. 4. Robot spelling—This might be kind of a strange thing to like about the performance, but I loved it when Leaf’s toy robot took over his body and spelled for him. I just thought it was hilarious, how Leaf would be rambling on about something irrelevant, then suddenly his entire posture and mannerisms would shift into mechanical, robotic detachment, then the spell would lift and he would be the same bemused, goofy Leaf he was before. 5. Ending wrap-up—I’m not normally one for epilogues, but I actually really liked how the ending returned to all of the characters and showed us a small piece of their adult lives and how their experiences with the spelling bee impacted them. It gave the play a sense of conclusion that simply ending with the spelling bee winner being declared would not have.

Cons 1. Throwing candy—I was seated four rows back from the stage, so when Chip began throwing candy into the audience, it caught me off guard and I almost got brained by a Tootsie Roll. Although it was a somewhat nice way to tie in his new role in the competition, reduced to nothing more than a snack purveyor, I did not appreciate the hail of hard candy being delivered while I was still trying to pay attention to the action on stage. 2. No intermission—My first fault with the play leads straight into this one: I more than halfway expected the house lights to come up and the audience to be released for an intermission when Chip began wandering through the audience with his box of candy and snacks. Actually, I almost expected him to really act as a snack vendor and begin trying to sell the candy to nearby audience members, then encourage us to leave to get snacks of our own. It seemed like the right time for the intermission, which never actually came. Although I suppose an intermission wasn’t strictly necessary, it would have been a nice break for the families, such as the one seated beside me, who came to see the show with small children. 3. Age of characters—For me at least, it was very hard to tell how old the characters were actually supposed to be. Some of them, like Logainne and Leaf, seemed very young, elementary school age even, while others, such as Barfee and Marcy, seemed high school age at least. I believe that some of the dialogue indicated that Logainne actually was in elementary school, but I didn’t notice ages being indicated for any of the other characters. Olive sometimes came off as a mature character, but then would seemingly regress into someone almost as young as Logainne. And, because of Chip’s ‘problem’, he must have been older than elementary school age. I thought that spelling bees were arranged into some kind of age brackets so that very young competitors were not placed at a disadvantage against older spellers. Overall, that aspect of the characters seemed very inconsistent to me and was somewhat irritating and distracting throughout the play. 4. Stereotyped black character—I thought it was sad that the only black actor in the production was mainly cast in such a negative, stereotyped role. Mitch, the delinquent ‘hood’ who is grudgingly working off his community service hours? Who is so fearsome and intimidating that the bee participants all shrink away from merely his glare and retreat in terror when he makes a move toward them? It was just so cliché and seemed constricting to an actor who really shone in his other bit parts in the production, as ‘Black Jesus’ or a gay dad or a distant doctor. 5. ‘Black Jesus’—Although I personally thought that ‘Black Jesus’ was meant to be funny, not offensive, I could see how some people might have been offended by that characterization of Jesus, as somewhat uncaring and laid back, so much so that he actually tells the person praying to him that her problems really aren’t much of a concern to him. Since a fair number of the audience was likely Christian and might have been offended by this, it could have a negative impact on the show and even the theater’s future success.