THE SPONGEBOB MUSICAL Cygnet Theatre
I feel it is emblematic of the dominant culture’s abject refusal of sincerity that I feel the need to be immediately defensive about my positive feelings towards The SpongeBob Musical at Cygnet Theatre. It seems to me genuine enjoyment, not even of childish things but of really anything, is looked upon with ambivalence if not hostility; it is chic not to show you care. To the mindset of caring as weakness, The SpongeBob Musical is strong physic. This show is the most earnestly fun, goofy, rambunctious outing you could take your inner child out to for a night of theatre.
If you were no big fan of Spongebob the television show growing up, you needn’t be. The characters are introduced with all you need to know about them in the show, and humor dependent upon an existing familiarity with the characters is kept to a minimum. Deprive the show of its cultural capital as based on the ubiquitous children’s TV show, and you are left with a delightfully silly romp with surprisingly good music and a level of zany fun that borders on camp.
Bailey Lee as Spongebob in “The SpongeBob Musical" Karli Cadel Photography.
Rather than commissioning a single artist to write the music and lyrics to the show, Tina Landau, the creative mind behind The SpongeBob Musical, rather contracted a number of notable musical artists to compose the songs, including Panic! At the Disco, The Plain White T’s, and They Might Be Giants. Despite their disparate origins, the music meshes together very well, and tells the story miraculously, reflecting a clearly well-informed set of musical artists who are capable of making a suitable score.
Spongebob (Audrey Deubig) and his friends are enjoying a blissful benthic existence in the picturesque Bikini Bottom, when the nearby volcano, Mount Humonguous, begins sending tremors through the town, revealing that its dormancy has ended, and it will very soon send rivers of magma running through the streets, destroying the peaceful life Spongebob and co have known for all these years. Spongebob, determined not to be underestimated by his peers, sets out to stop the volcano alongside his best friends Patrick Star ()the starfish and Sandy Cheeks (Rebecca Murillo) the undersea squirrel from Texas. The show is mostly able to hold itself to the plot it sets out, though it frequently becomes distracted to indulge in some delightful musical numbers, which mirrors the classic excitable style of Spongebob humor.
The performances at Cygnet’s production match the script by being goofy, wild, and totally feel-good. The whole of the Spongebob brand relies a lot on stereotype for its comedy, especially among its supporting players, but the cast at Cygnet infuse personability and specificity into their performances and it makes the show very fun to watch. Kudos to the vibrant and talented Audrey Deubig who went on for Spongebob the night I saw the show and gave an electric performance. Two other highlights were Sheldon J. Plankton (Drew Bradford) and Sandy Cheeks; the former has a spectacular bassy voice that complemented his nefarious plans very well, and the latter gave an exceptionally charming performance as a squirrel who just wants the people to trust in science. Like any good clown comedy, the show employs a foley artist to color the performance with sound effects, and Coleman Ray Clark did an exemplary job of heightening the wackiness to the max with his live foley work.
The scenic design matched the aesthetics of the television show very closely and worked very well to highlight the foley artist and onstage band while giving the actors plenty of room to play; an altogether admirable aquatic mise-en-scene. Zaniness was a priority in creating the props, and the extendable chair and boulders of miscellaneous sizes feel right at home in the world of the show.
One thing I will say is that the progressive politics of the show are oversimplified at best. I am of course deserving of ridicule for expecting nuanced leftist theory in a show based on a children’s cartoon, but I’m optimistic that one day even Spongebob can teach the kids socialism. The book pays lip service to the perils of xenophobia, and the populace of Bikini Bottom spends most of the first act in a racist mob ready to oust Sandy for being a land mammal. Although the ultimate message is one of kindness, togetherness, and science overcoming bigotry and climate catastrophe, the resolution still rings hollow. Despite facing the equivalent of racial prejudice from the town (whom she works tirelessly to save and can be singularly credited with the preservation of) for the whole show, she ultimately accepts living among the society that turned against her on a dime the minute there was trouble, under the apparent erroneous conviction that they will not do so again, even with her having saved their skins.
If you do not mind what the politics of The SpongeBob Musical are, that’s fine, and the politics are perfectly acceptable, if complacent with the status quo. You’ll still enjoy the lovely tunes, the hilarious and endearing acting, and notorious nautical nonsense.
The Spongebob Musical is playing through July 12th
