Anyone of a certain age can imagine Gene Kelly shouting the exhortation to dance in the movie “Singin’ in the Rain” (1952). Those who were young in 1984, along with actor Kevin Bacon, can likewise finish the earworm lyric: “Please, Louise” with its continuation “pull me off of my knees!” from the film “Footloose.” The latter line makes no particular sense. There’s no Louise in the plot. “Louise” just rhymes well with “knees,” where a happily exhausted dancer might be temporarily stuck. But the point of both lines in both movies is the same: People — particularly young people — simply must have the opportunity to dance. A prohibition would be … unenforceable and insane! Then in 1998, a musical stage adaptation of “Footloose” with lyrics by Dean Pitchford and music by five composers, including Kenny Loggins, composer of the title song, was first produced, giving the ’80s film a second (adapted) life. That life continued as a Virginia Musical Theatre production this past weekend at the Sandler Center for the Performing Arts in Virginia Beach under the impetus of VMT’s executive director Mark Hudgins and artistic director Chip Gallagher. “Footloose” is, of course, a perfect closer for Virginia Musical Theatre’s 33rd season since it accommodates a host of students, most of them from the Governor’s School for the Arts in Norfolk, where Gallagher is chairman of the musical theater department. The choreography by Angela Brown is terrific — creative, challenging and almost universally well executed. The show “Footloose” has always been an odd mix of raucous high school musical and serious Bildungstheater (theater of education). Though it’s always thought of as the (dance-filled!) show about the town that prohibits dancing, it is also about how to process life’s tragedies. Our young protagonist learning about the latter is Ren (well played by VMT alumnus Conor Crowley). His antagonist — actually an aging protagonist himself — is the town of Bomont’s highly influential evangelical-style minister: the Rev. Shaw Moore (played with gravitas by local Equity pro Scott Wichmann). Here are the losses our two male leads must finally face and process: Ren’s father has abruptly deserted him and his mother (luminous actor BreAnne Okoren), totally disappearing from both of their lives. They have been forced to leave their home in Chicago to move to the small town of Bomont and stay with relatives. Ren struggles to fit in at his new high school and at his various part-time jobs (skating waiter among them). He does, however, make a friend in Willard Hewitt (Dylan Jackson Cavasos, fine at impersonating a winsome “hick”). Moore, his wife Vi (also winsome local actor Kathy Hinson) and their daughter Ariel (Taylor Anne Drumwright, an adept alumna of national tours) have faced a similarly devastating loss: Their son, along with three others, was killed in an auto accident on a nearby bridge while out on the town (presumably dancing) five years back. It is this loss that has prompted Moore to get a prohibition against dance passed by the town council. Ariel, the perfect “PK” (preacher’s kid), is reacting to her brother’s loss by acting out and dating the questionable toughie dropout Chuck Cranston (Chris “C.J.” Doss, the other Equity member in the cast). When he becomes physically abusive, Ariel drops him and turns to our hero Ren as her new partner. (Cue the hit musical number “Holding Out for a Hero.”) Her own friend takes up with Ren’s friend. (“Let’s Hear It for the Boy” was another hit from this show.) With the right partners involved, love blossoms. (“Almost Paradise” was yet another hit from this show.) Ren mounts a student protest against the dance prohibition, speaking eloquently before the town council. He’s nonetheless defeated by Rev. Moore’s bloc of supporters. A resolution is reached only when the two men — one young, the other middle-aged — meet to talk out their sense of loss and grief: Ren’s for his missing father, Moore’s for his departed son. We suspect that Ren may someday become Moore’s son-in-law, not a replacement for his deceased son but a happy addition to their family. The dance ban is, of course, lifted, proving that a good talk can solve problems (something the women in the show have recommended from the start). Our cast has, of course, been dancing all night in violation of the code! Now, all can be forgiven. This is a show with an unusual number of hit songs. This makes it all the more challenging when actors must execute those songs that were not hits outside of the show. The Act 1 finale (“Heaven Help Me”) is unfortunately one of the non-hits, and therefore needs special work in this or any production. Audiences’ expectations of (and demand for) a hit song before intermission and at the end of a show have only grown stronger over time. Fortunately, there’s plenty of good acting and dancing to compensate for the weaker numbers (Cowboy Bob’s “Still Rockin’” being an example of the latter). But VMT’s strong production values — professional quality sets (with a disco ball when apropos), costumes, lighting, sound, good choreography — always prevail. When an entire river trestle for a train is flown in from aloft for a single scene, one has to “give the boy a hand” (those “boys” being scenic designer Ben Needham, technical director Eric Tuthill, music director of the eight-piece band, John B. DeHaas, and others). The value of Virginia Musical Theatre to the community is inestimable, and to slightly alter another lyric from “Let’s Hear It for the Boy,” I say: “We love you, love you, love you, ” and “ we always have a real good time.”
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