House Lights: Gorilla Man
Staging a rock musical in a bar takes serious balls—and one massive cock
Staging a rock musical in a bar takes serious balls—and one massive cock
Susie Gidseg
Spencer Driggers and Andrew Varenhost of Gorilla Man
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If the purpose of art is to reflect the society in which it occurs, then according to the Vestige Group's newest show at Creekside Lounge, we are downright terrified of gorillas.
Believe it or not, there's a case to be made for that argument. After all, Kyle Jarrow's musical comedy Gorilla Man—about a teenage boy who discovers his unusual hirsuteness is more than just puberty, and sets out to find answers from his carnival freak father—first bowed in New York in 2005 to wide acclaim from Variety and The Village Voice, among others, yet remained largely dormant until Vestige’s Susie Gidseg and Jen Brown decided to stage their own production here in Austin. If not for our culture’s innate, unspoken fear of gorillas, why would a show as delightful as Gorilla Man be left unperformed?
Make no mistake, Gorilla Man is delightful, and the Vestige production capitalizes on the best of what the script and book have to offer. The cast is magnetic—particularly Spencer Driggers' narrator, the glue of the show—and Brown and musical director Andrew Varenhost both deliver at least one truly memorable scene each in their multiple roles onstage.
At just over an hour and fifteen minutes, Gorilla Man runs relatively short, which demonstrates an admirable restraint not always prevalent among musical productions. It also fits the tone of the show: It is, after all, a rock musical staged in a rock club, and a sprawling two-act examination of man's-inhumanity-to-gorilla-man would be slightly inappropriate. Instead, Gorilla Man simply hits all the right notes and vanishes like a half-glimpsed pink elephant, offering either an unconventional way to spend some time in a bar, or an opportunity to see exciting theater in an unusual space, depending on how you want to look at it. After a performance of the show early in its run, Decider spoke with Brown and Gidseg (who also directs) to talk about braving the drunks, why their usually deadly serious troupe decided to try its hand at musical comedy, and, of course, that show-stealing codpiece.
Jen BrownSusie GidsegDecider: Why stage Gorilla Man at Creekside?
Jen Brown: When I first read the script, I said, "I want to do this at a bar. That's where the show really fits in." I'm friendly with the owners of the Creekside, and they had just opened the music venue side of it, and they were really excited about doing something different. It ended up working out perfectly. I mean, absolutely perfectly.
D: This show also seems especially interactive. Is that what initially drew you to it?
JB: Definitely. When I first read the script that was one of the things I noticed about it. It's very audience-participation oriented. It's not like you sit there quietly and say, “Oh, that's pretty.” You really get to be a part of it.
Susie Gedsig: We added the “Boo” and “Yay” signs and had the actors get down in the audience, because it keeps you in it. It doesn't let you check out.
D: Was that another reason why you decided to stage it in a bar?
SG: Absolutely. It gets people excited. Once people get a beer in them, they're a lot more responsive!
D: How did you first come across the script?
JB: I like to go through and see what new plays are out, and I read the blurb and I thought, "This sounds awesome." So I bought it on a whim and read it, and just fell in love with it. I went to [playwright] Kyle Jarrow's website and listened to the music, looked at his other productions, read all about him, and just really fell in love with the idea of the show. He's a young, new playwright bringing this really fun stuff to theatre. I thought it was a great fit for us, and for Austin.
Jen Brown: When I first read the script, I said, "I want to do this at a bar. That's where the show really fits in." I'm friendly with the owners of the Creekside, and they had just opened the music venue side of it, and they were really excited about doing something different. It ended up working out perfectly. I mean, absolutely perfectly.
D: This show also seems especially interactive. Is that what initially drew you to it?
JB: Definitely. When I first read the script that was one of the things I noticed about it. It's very audience-participation oriented. It's not like you sit there quietly and say, “Oh, that's pretty.” You really get to be a part of it.
Susie Gedsig: We added the “Boo” and “Yay” signs and had the actors get down in the audience, because it keeps you in it. It doesn't let you check out.
D: Was that another reason why you decided to stage it in a bar?
SG: Absolutely. It gets people excited. Once people get a beer in them, they're a lot more responsive!
D: How did you first come across the script?
JB: I like to go through and see what new plays are out, and I read the blurb and I thought, "This sounds awesome." So I bought it on a whim and read it, and just fell in love with it. I went to [playwright] Kyle Jarrow's website and listened to the music, looked at his other productions, read all about him, and just really fell in love with the idea of the show. He's a young, new playwright bringing this really fun stuff to theatre. I thought it was a great fit for us, and for Austin.
Spencer DriggersSusie Gidseg
D: Usually Vestige does more serious work. What attracted you to a musical comedy?
SG: Marisol, our last show, was really intense. I mean, really intense. There was a lot of baggage and everyone was really depressed when they left—and while I like affecting the audience in that way, we've done so much serious stuff for so long that we thought, "Okay, we need something where we can play." We find that Austin's really into camp.
JB: I, personally, am crazy into camp. This is so beyond up my alley. As soon as I read the script, I called Susie and said, "I found our next show!"
SG: "It's about gorillas!" And I'm like, "Uh, yeah, we're doing serious work..."
JB: "No, no! It's about a gorilla who’s a man, it's a musical, and it's awesome!"
SG: Neither Jen nor I have any musical theatre background, but Jen recruited Henna [Chou], our musical lead. She found the band, and then we brought in Andrew [Varenhost] as our musical director. It really is a very collaborative team.
D: There’s one more star of the show that’s not in the official cast list: The Gorilla Man's codpiece. What’s the story there?
JB: Okay, so… We wanted something that was just simple and dark. And honestly, that was really just the costume designer at work. I told her, "I want a codpiece, something to just cover the bottom [of the suit]." And she asked me, "How big do you want it?" I didn't realize she was going to stuff it.
SG: He's a very manly gorilla.
JB: Very manly. When he first put it on, I couldn't keep my eyes off of it. I was just like, "Oh my God. Gorilla cock."
SG: Marisol, our last show, was really intense. I mean, really intense. There was a lot of baggage and everyone was really depressed when they left—and while I like affecting the audience in that way, we've done so much serious stuff for so long that we thought, "Okay, we need something where we can play." We find that Austin's really into camp.
JB: I, personally, am crazy into camp. This is so beyond up my alley. As soon as I read the script, I called Susie and said, "I found our next show!"
SG: "It's about gorillas!" And I'm like, "Uh, yeah, we're doing serious work..."
JB: "No, no! It's about a gorilla who’s a man, it's a musical, and it's awesome!"
SG: Neither Jen nor I have any musical theatre background, but Jen recruited Henna [Chou], our musical lead. She found the band, and then we brought in Andrew [Varenhost] as our musical director. It really is a very collaborative team.
D: There’s one more star of the show that’s not in the official cast list: The Gorilla Man's codpiece. What’s the story there?
JB: Okay, so… We wanted something that was just simple and dark. And honestly, that was really just the costume designer at work. I told her, "I want a codpiece, something to just cover the bottom [of the suit]." And she asked me, "How big do you want it?" I didn't realize she was going to stuff it.
SG: He's a very manly gorilla.
JB: Very manly. When he first put it on, I couldn't keep my eyes off of it. I was just like, "Oh my God. Gorilla cock."
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