An Open Letter from WFT Producer

Concern has been expressed that the only visual difference between Cheo Bourne, who plays the Ugly Duckling, and the other ducklings is his costume, his height, and that he is African American. We want to respond to these concerns.

The costume was a deliberate design choice - after all, he is a swan and not a duck. Cheo’s height and race were not the reason he was cast in the role. He was the best actor who auditioned for the part. And we are confident you will find his performance stellar.

WFT understands, given the insidious nature of racism endemic in our society, the fact that Cheo is African American has the potential to send the wrong message. We concur with Anthony Drewe, who wrote HONK!’s book and lyrics, that: “The principle theme of the show is clearly the acceptance of others who may appear different for whatever reason. The main message we wanted the audience to go away with was that difference is OK,. It is something to be welcomed, embraced, and celebrated rather than feared, misunderstood, or persecuted.” That has always been the message of the Wheelock Family Theatre and we joyously present it once again in HONK!

Thank you.
Susan Kosoff, Producer

Boston Metro Gives a HONK!

Boston Metro interviews Cheo Bourne and Aimee Doherty Wednesday February 17, 2010.

HONK!

Ducks and Frogs and Geese, Oh My!

by Mary ElizaBeth Peters
Teaching Artist at WFT blog contributor

When you look for a play that the whole family will enjoy, you look first to Wheelock Family Theatre. WFT is known for creating plays that are not only enjoyable to young kids – as young as three! – but to entire families. WFT simply does not believe in staging plays that are “just for the kiddies,” and they go overboard to make sure their dance, comedy and acting styles are truly inclusive to every person who comes through the door. Because of this commitment – everyone comes through the door.

That being said, I entered the opening night performance of Honk! with some trepidation. WFT usually plans a season that has a play for each child age group: lower elementary; upper elementary; middle and high school. However, the young show doesn’t usually go that young. I was not that intrigued by the idea of this simple story. And to be brutally honest, Honk! is sort of known for turning out poorly. The script by Drewe and Stiles is simply not that strong.

To my surprise, I was entertained from start to finish, not only by the performance of Honk! itself, but by the WFT experience at opening night. It was wonderful to read the bios of young WFT actors, as well as seasoned professionals, and see them work alongside one another. I felt a giddy feeling in my stomach for my former students when I saw each of them onstage, knowing that the experience alone of being in professional rehearsals will affect them as actors second and as young emotion-filled human beings first.

The production is visual dazzling – the colors and textures in the set and lighting design envelope you into the story. You are in the story book of young Ugly Duckling, and able to follow him on this visual journey as the play progresses.

The casting was quite impressive, incorporating actors in age from elementary school to retirement, and containing an ethnically diverse cast as we have come to take for granted at WFT. I can honestly say that performances were strong throughout the cast, and particularly from the young dancers, who made their performances as fish, frogs and chickens seem effortless. Jane Staab directed, and her choice to have the actors-as-animals play more human, than animal, worked well for me. Young audience members did not seem confused at all and the story was made clearer without hammy animal accents or cheesy indicative motions. The actors, instead, worked to represent their animal selves through subtle gesture and a way of walking, running, or dancing. In this way, their movement was fluid and beautiful in its storytelling.

The audience audibly gasped and murmured seeing the beautiful set reveal at the top of the show, and following each set change. Matthew T. Lazure’s set design, and particularly his choice of color and texture, was beautiful, silly, and left a lot for the audience to visually explore throughout the production. His attention to shape was impeccable, as well. The part of my drama teacher mind that still works like a five year old was entertained finding the stars and triangles throughout the design. The Duckling eggs alone gave me a shape-shifting giggle. Without ruining their surprise use onstage, I will say that seeing the ducks put on their dancing feet first was a silly, energizing choice that still makes me chuckle to remember.

Cheo Bourne was excellent as Ugly, and this young professional actor was a great example to his younger fellow actors backing him up. His timing was wonderful, his speaking voice and articulation were clear, and his emotional journey was both heartwarming and on-par with the intended audience for this production. Stealing the show – Greylag, or the General Goose, played by Scott Severance. He cracked me up, and had the audience rolling. Just when you thought their antics could not get any more ridiculous, Gary Thomas Ng would one-up the group and we would be in stitches again.

Once again, WFT delivers a top-notch production from beginning to end that will be sure to delight audiences throughout the run! In particular, I encourage every WFT drama student and Wheelock College future educator to take in this show!

HONK in Theater Mirror

Just Ducky at Wheelock
By Beverly Creasey

George Stiles and Anthony Drewe’s cheeky barnyard musical, HONK! (based on Hans Christian Anderson’s “The Ugly Duckling”) is getting a high flying production at Wheelock Family Theatre (playing through Feb. 28th)

Director Jane Staab’s energized cast includes some of Boston’s top performers—working side by side with a passel of talented kids as fish, ducklings, and assorted fauna. The musical will appeal to children for its silly antics but adults will find it refreshingly irreverent… and vegetarians (like me) will be overjoyed with its pro-animal stance: All the creatures on the farm know that “people are bad news!” Poor Mayor Turkey (Gary Thomas Ng) is positively phobic over the thought of Thanksgiving.

Aimee Doherty is sublime as the doting mother duck who produces a brood which includes an odd looking, oversized hatchling. She refused to give up on him because he’s different, even though everyone else disapproves, especially her less than helpful husband (Mark Linehan). Doherty can break your heart with a weepy like “Every Tear a Mother Cries” and triumph with a transcendent mother and child reunion.

Cheo Bourne is magnificent as the exuberant signet mistaken for a duckling. There are several show stopping numbers in HONK! but Bourne’s gorgeous love song about another swan, “Now I’ve Seen You” will leave you breathless.

Scott Severance and company strut the heck out of a hilarious “Wild Goose Chase” and Peter Carey has a hopping good time as a saucy song and dance frog. Sarah deLima makes a grand dame of a fowl, Jaime Montessano a magnificent lap cat and Brian Richard Robinson a nasty tomcat of a villain (who croons the Sondheimish “Play With Your Food”). Music director Jon Goldberg gets terrific singing from the whole menagerie. I was worried that the smallest of audience members might get restless in the long first act but I heard nary a “peep!”

HONK! HONK! HONK!

BOSTON: Talking Broadway
Regional Reviews by Matthew Small

"The Ugly Duckling" sings and dances his way into our hearts in a rousing Wheelock Family Theatre production of Honk! at Wheelock College. Created in 1993 by Anthony Drewe (music) and George Styles (lyrics and book), the musical is not only a delight for children, but also entertaining and engaging for the grown-ups.

Director Jane Staab has assembled a team of designers and actors who deliver a delightful fairytale world. Matthew T. Lazure's fantastic storybook illustration-inspired set is magically illuminated and chromatically transformed by Scott Clyve's lighting design. Dustin Todd Rennells delivers dozens of rich, colorful costumes for the personified animals on the stage.

The cast of Honk! creates a dynamite ensemble whose talents match the flair of the Olivier Award-winning material. There are many feathered friends, foes and family members of Ugly, the little bird born from an egg unlike any the ducks have seen before. Along with the barnyard fowl, the story includes fish, turtles, cats and other creatures Ugly meets while he is lost and searching for his mother. The adult ensemble's comedic timing is tight, while the children's chorus is endearing—especially during the finale ultimo.

Aimee Doherty and Cheo Bourne lead the flock. Doherty portrays Ida, a mother duck determined to maintain normalcy for a son who is born looking different than his brothers and sisters. If only everyone could have a mother so kind—and so talented. As Ugly, Bourne glows with a remarkable, inward resilience, despite the ridicule he receives for his otherness. Boston producers should plan to witness Bourne's commanding song-and-dance performance before casting their shows for next season.

Wheelock Family Theatre maintains a wonderful commitment to expand beyond audiences of privilege. With Honk!, the company offers closed captioning, sound enhancement devices, sign language interpreters for select performances, low ticket prices throughout the run, and an incredible cast of diverse races and ethnicities. This is the way theater should be.

Honk! roosts in Boston for a few weeks only, so plan to take your kids (or some that you borrow) to the Wheelock Family Theatre, 200 The Riverway, before February 28.

HONK! "Soars" at WFT

The Boston Globe Review by Terry Byrne

Honk, or just stand up and cheer, for a charming musical adaptation of the classic fairy tale “The Ugly Duckling,’’ now at the Wheelock Family Theatre.

“Honk!,’’ by the British team of George Stiles and Anthony Drewe (who wrote the new music for the Broadway version of “Mary Poppins’’), is a joyous celebration of being yourself, wrapped up in some hummable tunes guaranteed to send you out singing.

Stiles and Drewe, who won the Olivier award in 1990 for the show, begin with Hans Christian Andersen’s story, in which one “different’’-looking duckling, named “Ugly’’ in this musical, doesn’t fit in. But Drewe adds plot twists and complications aimed squarely at the adults in the crowd. There’s Ugly’s efforts to avoid becoming lunch for a Cat (“Play With Your Food’’), his meeting with a flock of migrating geese (“The Wild Goose Chase’’), his adventures with two mismatched pals (“Together’’), and a Bullfrog who tells him someone will love him, “Warts and All.’’ Drewe also pulls out every “fowl’’ pun he can find, cracking wise about everything from Frank Perdue to duck decoys. All of this works because Stiles’s music is so melodic and Drewe’s lyrics move the plot along.

Director Jane Staab keeps the show from drifting into cartoon with the help of Matthew T. Lazure’s spare, evocative, two-tiered set and Dustin Todd Rennells’s simple, color-coordinated costumes that suggest the various barnyard animals without going too far. Staab has also cast a terrific ensemble, whose members add enormous nuance to the characters they portray. Cheo Bourne, a young actor who’s getting his first shot at a starring role with Ugly, is a wonderful singer and dancer with a strong stage presence. It’s a thrill to see someone of his talent get into the limelight.

Boston favorite Aimee Doherty plays Ugly’s mother, Ida, who has the musical’s best song, “Every Tear a Mother Cries’’ and serves as the show’s emotional anchor. Brian Richard Robinson plays the hungry Cat with smooth style, Scott Severance steals his scenes as Greylag, the hilariously misguided leader of the migrating geese, and Peter A. Carey makes an amusing vaudevillian Bullfrog. But it’s almost unfair to single out any one performer, as every member of this company delivers, whether it’s Gary Thomas Ng’s Turkey, landing recurring Thanksgiving jokes, or Sarah deLima’s fussy hen, fretting about her friend.

Choreographer Laurel Conrad Stachowicz’s imaginative dance moves include everything from a Busby Berkeley-style production number to a kick line for newly hatched ducklings. She and Staab have also clearly coached all the actors to give their characters distinctly detailed animal qualities.

Musical director and conductor Jon Goldberg makes his five-piece ensemble sound rich and complex. He sets the tempo for Staab, who starts the show at a high energy level and never lets up. This “Honk!’’ doesn’t just fly, it soars.

HONK! Opening Night.

"The Tutu Girl!"

A Review-Preview by Mary ElizaBeth Peters,

WFT Teaching Artist.

It is opening night of “Honk!” at Wheelock Family Theatre. I am sitting far to the right side of the audience enjoying this silly, crazy, sweet musical with my mother. I see a little girl in the wings, offstage. She is wearing an elaborate green tutu that juts out in all crazy directions, and she is fluffing it up with her hands, and spinning around in circles, pointing and silently laughing at her counterpart in the wings on the other side of the stage. The two girls are pointing and giggling, spinning and laughing, jumping and making the motion, “Shh!” at each other. Waiting for their big entrance into the frog scene, they are not supposed to be onstage yet. They are supposed to be invisible.

I glance around, preparing to write my big blog review (this one) and quickly realize – it’s not just me, the zany drama teacher, who is captivated by the young theatre student having an early experience of pure joy waiting to make her onstage debut, it is the entire audience in my section. They are all giggling and smiling about the little girl in the tutu. They are elbowing each other and pointing, looking at the girl and then exchanging a glance with each other, smiling and nodding. She is hilarious and adorable in what she thinks is secret excitement. “Oh my!” my mother whispers, and covers her face, embarrassed for the silly little girl.

Oh no! We’re supposed to be watching the play! I think to myself. Bad drama teacher! Watch the play! Watch the play! Certainly, the team of “Honk!” would be horrified if they knew that our section of the seats was focused offstage for so long, looking past the onstage action. We should be watching the WFT play!

Then, I realize – this is part of the joy of the Wheelock Family Theatre experience. Not only to experience the joy of the performance itself – as that review will now have to be posted tomorrow – but watching a young person turn their joy into art, as the entire audience, not only my tiny section, was able to see the young tutu’d frog turn her excitement into a beautiful, energetic dance that captivated everyone. “Uh oh, she’s hooked!”whispers my mother, and I laugh. My mother is right. The little tutu girl is clearly a part of this theatre now, as our audience is mutually “hooked” on watching her joyful performance. Just another example, like in the story of young Ugly Duckling, that you never know where or why you might find something so very beautiful.

Watch this week – my true review of this performance to follow!