Something is rotten in the city of Ketchikan. It’s the First City Players’ newest production, to be specific — a locally star-studded performance of the Tony-nominated Broadway musical Something Rotten! The show opened at the Ketchikan High School Auditorium stage on Nov. 15.
The music for Something Rotten! was written by two brothers — Karey and Wayne Kirkpatrick. After a script was penned by Karey Kirkpatrick and comedic scriptwriter John O’Farrell, the play premiered on Broadway in 2015.
Now, it’s making its Southeast Alaska debut thanks to First City Players Director Elizabeth Nelson.
“It delights me. It’s just great,” Nelson said. “Directing shows that you love is so much easier than directing shows because you feel you should.”
Something Rotten! is the story of two brothers, Nick and Nigel Bottom, during the English Renaissance. They’re played on the Kayhi stage by Kyle Bailey and Dan Magno, respectively.
The brothers are aspiring bards. Think William Shakespeare — except Nick Bottom hates Shakespeare. As the story goes, Bottom used to be in a theater troupe with Shakespeare until the Bard of Avon became wildly popular. Now, Shakespeare performs to adoring crowds while Bottom is struggling to make ends meet for he and his wife Bea, played here by Brittany Rickard.
Nelson said a lot went into making this production happen. The cast and crew had been rehearsing the play four to six days a week for the last ten weeks. She said that even then, though, it felt like it all came down to the wire.
“It’s a mad rush,” Nelson said.
Quickly, audiences learn that Nick Bottom deeply envies the success of his enemy William Shakespeare. He decides he needs a competitive advantage — a way to anticipate the next big thing in theater. So, the elder Bottom goes to see someone who might be able to help: Nostradamus.
“Not that Nostradamus,” the man says after introducing himself. He explains he is Nostradamus’ nephew: Thomas Nostradamus.
“The future of theater will be… musicals!” Thomas Nostradamus reveals after looking into the cloudy future.
“What are musicals?” Nick Bottom asks.
The seer tells him it’s a play where the dialogue stop at random and the plot is conveyed through song. Bottom is skeptical.
“Well that is the stupidest thing that I have ever heard,” Bottom says, breaking into song halfway through.
Meanwhile, his brother Nigel, a talented poet, is falling in love with a Puritan girl named Portia, played by Olivia Kantor. Her father, a stiff and prude man of the faith, isn’t a fan of the idea of musicals. Music leads to dancing, he says, which stirs the loins.
“Which is why we must see the theaters torn down. For we cannot abide by such ungodly erections!” he screams at the Bottom brothers after they perform their first failed musical, an untimely ode to the Black Death plague that swept Europe.
At some point, Nigel and Portia also join a large crowd gathered to see Shakespeare perform. The energy is electric.
Shakespeare struts onto stage. The Bard is played by Kayhi drama teacher Tommy Varella-Kossack. The crowd on-stage and off-stage goes wild.
“Is it good to see me or what?” Shakespeare shouts over the squeals of his adoring fans.
In this imagining, Shakespeare is a brash, lusty sex symbol. A medieval rock star in tight leather breeches.
“Of course you would. I’m Shakespeare!” he says, after asking Nigel Bottom if he’d like him to review the younger poet’s work.
Nelson said Varela-Kossack is just one of so many local talents gracing this production, which also includes regulars to the local stage like Niles Corporon, Clare Bennett, Russell Wodehouse, and Keith Smith.
“So, so good to be within a group of people who all care so deeply about making something excellent,” Nelson said.
After he is snubbed by Shakespeare at a party, Nick returns to Thomas Nostradamus, played by Austin Hays, with the goal of stealing Sheakespeare’s greatest idea before he thinks of it. The hapless prophet looks into the future and, after maybe accidentally predicting the Empire from Star Wars and a series of other plays and musicals, he has a vision.
“I see it! Shakespeare’s greatest play. The one they will be talking about for generations to come. And this play will be called… ‘Omelet!’” Nostradamus declares.
And so the Bottom brothers set out to make the greatest play of all time — not Hamlet but, rather, “Omelet.”
Nelson said it’s hard not to smile through the whole show. Though, she said making the production happen wasn’t all smiles.
“I will say that this show has had more hiccups than almost any show I have ever directed,” she said. Nelson has been a giant in the Ketchikan drama scene for well over 30 years.
Two major hiccups came just days before the Friday premiere.
“A week before we opened, one of our cast members was in a car accident,” Nelson said.
After weeks of rehearsal, local elementary school music teacher Jillian Pollock, who was cast as the female lead Bea Bottom, was struck by another driver on the highway near Ketchikan. According to a GoFundMe page created by her co-star Kyle Bailey, Pollock suffered a broken nose and a severely sprained ankle. Nelson said they determined she couldn’t perform and needed an understudy, which is where Brittany Rickard came in.
Then, with the premiere just two days away, Annabelle Ballif came down with pneumonia. Ballif was the actress slated to play the other female lead, Portia. Olivia Kantor stepped into the daunting role with very little time to spare.
“Olivia is a junior in high school, she had one day, one full day, to learn her role,” said Nelson.
Kantor performed seemingly flawlessly. Kantor is turning the role back over to Ballif, who has made a full recovery, for the play’s second weekend.
The choreography and music also had the audience entranced.
“We have a number of local musicians who have been really loyal to us and perform our musicals every fall,” Nelson said.
Those regulars to the First City Players’ music pit include pianist Kim Henrickson and multi-instrumentalist Chazz Gist who Nelson said have been backbones of their productions for years. They were also accompanied by a new player for this production — Lilli Godwin on drums. Godwin is a senior at Kayhi and got involved after performing for the Kayhi Drama King’s production of Little Shop of Horrors.
There are quite a few large dance numbers in the play and Nelson said figuring out how to move all of those bodies around stage was the responsibility of local dance choreographer Katie Dossett, as well as Katie Blanford, a tap dance instructor the troupe flew in from Florida. Nelson said much of the cast had never tap danced before.
“It’s a delightful little gem of a show,” she said.
The show will be performed for its second weekend on the evenings of Nov. 21 and 22.. Tickets can be found online at FirstCityPlayers.org.
