The Kings of Christmas
by Doug Schutte
December 8-11, 15-19, 22-23 (all at 7:30 PM)
Advanced Tickets $18
At the door: $20
Recommended for ages 16+
Directed by Doug Schutte.
Starring Corey Music (Carter), Beth Tantanella (Wendy), Jake Beamer (Kennedy), Megan Adair (Carol), Ben Gierhart (Clinton), and Doug Schutte (Frank).
Schutte and Beamer return for their 6th consecutive season. Corey Music and Megan Adair return for their second season of Kings. And Beth Tantanella and Ben Gierhart--the originators of the Wendy and Clinton roles--return this year after one season away!
"I keep wanting to write a new holiday play," says Schutte, "but more and more people come to see the KINGS each year...and each year we keep adding more performances. So we'll just keep spreading the cheer. Of course, maybe this will be the year that all of the cast switches roles...I've been itching to play Aunt Sylvia."
Yes, the holiday tradition will be back for its 6th consecutive season this December!
Don't take our word for it. Listen to what last year's reviewer (Marty Rosen, LEO Weekly) had to say:
The madcap opening moments of “Kings” are flat-out brilliant – and the rest of the play lives up to the opening. This is among the best-written, best-executed riffs on Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” you’ll ever see. In fact, a word to the wise: stop reading for a moment and immediately order your tickets. This is the fourth season of “Kings,” and as with the Louisville Ballet’s “Nutcracker” and ATL’s “A Christmas Carol,” tickets are a hot commodity. “King’s” has become a holiday tradition for many Louisville theater-goers. Groups file in together and fill entire rows in the intimate performance space. After a packed Sunday night performance, I overheard a chorus of folks saying: “We’ll do it again next year.”
The first half of the play is a courtroom comedy like none other, with Uncle Frank as prosecutor (channeling his courtroom idol, Ben Matlock), Wendy as an earnestly impulsive defense attorney (who repeatedly objects to her own inappropriate remarks) and a judge and jury made from poster board cutouts. The highlight of the trial is an intricate series of Rashomon-like reenactments that depict various accounts of Marley’s demise. These scenes are comic writing of a high order – and the ensemble revels in the shape-shifting variations.
In the second half, the Rashomon conceit gives way to a full-blown variation on “A Christmas Carol.” The spirits of Christmas past, present and future are represented by the Elvis-impersonating Stein King (Schutte, in a virtuoso hip-twitching, performance). This spirit is a Vegas Elvis, dressed in satiny Vegas attire, speaking in a syrupy Tupelo drawl and littering his every speech with snippets from Elvis hits (56 references, we’re told, at one point and each funnier than the last). (Read the full review here)