Ojai ACT

by Sami Zahringer

 

As a rule, I try to avoid making nun jokes, but lately, it’s become a farce of habit. The reason is that one recent Sunday morning, I found myself sitting in the dark at Ojai Art Center Theater (OACT) watching a rehearsal run-through of “Nunsense,” the uproarious musical comedy hit by Dan Goggin.

The action opens, flummoxingly, on the set of a high-school production of “Grease” (Or “Vaseline,” as the confused Mother Superior has it.) We learn the nuns, The Little Sisters of Hoboken, are borrowing the school’s stage to put on an emergency fundraiser. The money is needed urgently due to a serious of calamities beginning with a leper colony and ending with 52 nuns face-down in their Vichysoisse. The soup, made by Sister Julia, Child of God, was contaminated with botulism, and the remaining nuns only avoided death by being at the bingo that supper-time. It’s an expensive business, burying nuns, and the Little Sisters, having spent some of the allotted money on an HGTV, still have 4 in the freezer to go, a fact the New Jersey Health Department takes a very dim view of.

In a former life, Mother Superior – Sister Mary Regina (Sindy McKay) was a tightrope walker, and so naturally, the only way to raise this money is to put on a variety show. Luckily, her remaining unpoisoned nuns also all have a taste for fame. One dreams of being the first ballet-dancing nun; one wants the Little Sisters of Hoboken to become the Big Sisters of Newark!; one can’t remember what she wants; and one simply wants to be a star.

Mother Superior takes charge of the benefit’s acts, which feature young novice Mary Leo (Brianna Turner), Sister Mary Hubert (Darienne Lissette Caldwell), Sister Mary Amnesia (Anna Kotula), and the rather stuffy Sister Mary Annette (also Anna Kotula). Sister Robert Anne (Dianne Miller), a nun-rescue from the streets who has seen it all, begs to be allowed her own solo. Mother Superior, wary of the inappropriate tone Robert Anne might set, is reluctant.

The scene is set for holy hijinks to begin, and no wimple will go unclutched.

Under the music direction of Andy Street and vocal director Darrienne Lissette Caldwell, each of the nuns is given a moment to shine musically in their solo spots and as a group, with fine attention paid to the blend and tight harmonies.

Aside from the inherently comic spectacle of high-kicking nuns dancing and playing basketball, the Mother Superior (Cindy McKay at her hilarious best) accidentally gets high on some confiscated “Rush”. McKay’s infectious laugh and comic timing made her character’s descent into/ascent unto highness hysterical.

Under the music direction of Andy Street and vocal director Caldwell, each nun is given a moment to shine musically both in their solo numbers and as a group, with fine attention paid to the blend and tight harmonies.

The pacing and comic delivery are divine as each actress fills her niche, and together all possessing strong voices that deliver songs with energy and verve. Anna Kotula in the scene-stealing role of Sister Mary Amnesia (who lost her memory when a crucifix fell on her head) has immaculate comic instincts and shines in “So You Want To Be A Nun,” nailing it vocally and comedically with her sarcastic hand puppet.

Dianne Miller as Sister Robert Anne provides a bubbly, lovable turn as the nun from Brooklyn who’s had a hard-knock life. Her voice is perfection, with a gorgeous, butter-mixed-with-gravel quality, and a vulnerable authenticity that brings warmth to the stage.

Darienne Lissette Caldwell’s naked ambition to be Top Nun and her sarcastic humor is a wry foil to the other nuns’ antics. Brianna Turner is an adorable novice sister; her voice is nigh-on angelic, and her ballet sequences switch easily between sublime and hilarious as “The Dying Nun”.

Amid the wacky fun, horseplay, and hi-jinks, the feel-good factor comes from the ensemble’s ability to show that despite the familiar irritations that exist between the sisters, these vastly different nuns not only tolerate but love each other. The five actors blow the bats out of the belfry with their dynamite chemistry and habit-raising harmonies.

The final soulful number, “Holier Than Thou,” led by the pyrotechnic professional vocals of Lissette Caldwell, is an energetic summation of the show in the final number “Holier Than Thou.” “Amen!” you might find yourself hollering. “Amen!”

Playwright Goggin sprinkles wordplay and outrageous puns throughout. There are wimple-rash jokes and every species of nun fun – do nuns even really have ears? Rarely has the word “romp” been so apt. It’s nun-stop!

Anna Kotula’s choreography is energizing and slyly witty. Director Tracey Williams Sutton has the experience to know when to let her nuns fly but also coaxes some genuinely touching moments, particularly from the salty, street-wise nun-rescue, Sister Robert Ann (a wonderfully earthy Dianne Miller).

“Nunsense” is produced by Herb Hemming and the indefatigable Anna Kotula. The show benefits from Dyane Landis’s stage management; set design is by Andrew Eiden; lighting by Dean Johnson; and costuming by Laura Comstock.

Don’t miss out on this transporting bit of summer fun! It’d be a sin to miss it!