Not feeling it

I am normally very skeptical of any production advertised as a “unique/hilarious/provocative/witty local twist” on some other well-known theatrical piece. Whether it is Midsummer Night’s Dream set in an urban Canadian dreamscape; The Winter’s Tale set in groovy rural Minnesota; or a Miss Julie that makes scathing observations about university social cliques; productions such as these are designed more to make audiences in any of the given locales knowingly wink and nod at the inside jokes and commentaries than to function as wholly-realized works of theater. But this being the festive time of year, I thought I would put aside my usual skepticism and go forth seeking peace on earth and good theater for the holiday season and take in a performance of DHM Productions’ A Don’t Hug Me Christmas Carol, a “hilarious” Minnesota musical spoof of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. I wish I hadn’t. The plot loosely follows that of Dickens’ classic. Set in the Bunyan, a small bar in northern Minnesota on Christmas Eve, the show revolves around bar owners and married couple Gunner and Clara, played by Ross Young and Bonni Allen. Gunner and Clara have been married going on ten years after meeting when Gunner played in the band of the famous folk singer Sven Jorgensen, around whose music the show is based. Gunner is a grumpy man largely because, we are led to believe, he wrote some of Sven’s hit songs but was never given credit, an injury only worsened by the fact that the jukebox in the bar plays only Jorgensen songs and periodically activates, seemingly for no reason at all. The marriage is rocky because the couple can’t have children due to Gunner’s “slow tadpoles.” Joined at the bar by local businessman and freeloader Kanute (Doug Anderson) and barmaid/karaoke star Bernice (Emily Trempe), Gunner and Clara get into a fight, Gunner threatens to cancel Christmas, and storms out to take a snowmobile ride around the lake. He falls in, falls into a coma, and comes back to the bar guided by the spirit of tuxedo-clad and mustachioed Sven Jorgensen going through his “Robert Goulet phase” (one of the few times in the evening that actually brought a smile to my face). When Gunner sees that no one is upset at the prospect of his imminent death, he makes a bargain with Sven to go back into the world of the living. First, he must visit scenes from Christmases past, present, and future. Since the plot amounts to a cliché adaptation, what really makes or breaks a show like this is the music. In this show, the music breaks it.

Rhymes with cookie

With nearly zero unity of content and form, the songs are almost completely divorced from the context of the play. Thus the only connection between a song like “Grandma Cut the Christmas Cheese” and what is actually happening on stage is that Clara has brought out a cheese ball and the mention of cheese activates the jukebox. Composer Paul Olson’s music is inane and there was not a single memorable tune among them. Book writer and lyricist Phil Olson can’t resist the temptation for embarrassingly facile rhyme; thus, for no reason except to fill a bar, we get such gems as rhyming "cookie" with "Wookie" in “Stuck in a Chimney.” That Ross Young’s version of acting involves squealing and prancing around the stage in a directionless/directedless fashion does not help matters, nor does he get much help from Doug Anderson’s Kanute, who couldn’t carry through on any jokes from what I can only assume is a congenital lack of comedic timing. Though Bonni Allen’s Clara was on the whole well-done within the constraints of this production, she was not well-served by the size of the space nor by the fact that all the actors were mic’d; she sounded like she was swallowing back her voice all night. Emily Trempe certainly has comedic chops and a strong voice, but director Phil Olson’s lack of imagination means that her most memorable moment onstage is when she sings “I’d Rather be Naughty” in a scanty Santa outfit. The show fails on almost every level: facile lyrics, amateur music, sub-par acting, and incompetent direction. Yet during the intermission I heard one woman say she laughed so hard her stomach hurt and indeed the audience seemed to be having a good time (yours truly excepted). Why is this?

Accounting for taste

You might say that it’s just a matter of taste, or that I’m an elitist asshole. You might say that because I’m not a native Minnesotan I just don’t get what’s so funny about bad hoser accents. Exceptions can be made for dramaturgical and theatrical weaknesses when the songs are truly funny, the actors good, and the timing is right. (Three strikes, in this production.) It doesn’t matter, with shows of this nature, whether they succeed or fail theatrically or musically. This show functions as a vehicle for jokes about Minnesota and Minnesotans: it winks at the audience and gives them permission to laugh by holding a mirror up to them and saying, “See! You can unwind for a few hours, have a few drinks, and laugh at yourself! No harm done.” The whole crowd laughed knowingly at the obligatory Lutheran jokes (there were two), the Scandinavian last names, and the mere mention of Lutefisk. With songs like “I Love You More Than Football,” husbands and wives can exchange amused glances. Songs like the offensive “Deep in the Closet,” which Gunner must sing to appease the spirit of Sven as Goulet, where actors prance around like little girls as a stand-in for homosexuality, reinforce the audience’s petty suburban prejudices and give them permission to laugh, even if the song isn’t funny. Shows like this are bromides for tightly wound, over-worked, underpaid folks who want – who deserve – a few minutes of relaxation. I can’t begrudge anyone the need to relax. But is it too much to ask, at this time of giving, for shows like this one to respect audiences enough to give them a show that both relaxes them and pays at least a little attention to form? Something that respects the audience enough to rise above the cheap joke for something just a bit more, well, funny? That would be my Christmas wish this year, in case Santa is reading. DHM Productions presents A Don’t Hug Me Christmas Carol Books, lyrics, and direction by Phil Olson Music by Paul Olson At the New Century Theatre in Minneapolis until January 1