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Top Hat’s ‘Nunsense’: Don’t dismiss it as such
YOUNGSTOWN
Catholic porn for the bingo crowd, “Nunsense” has been slaying ’em on the dinner-theater circuit since premiering off Broadway in 1985.
Having already spawned a slew of sequels (including “Nuncrackers,” “Meshuggah-Nuns,” “Nunsense A-Men”), the only frontier Dan Groggin’s hardy perennial hasn’t exploited is outer space.
The high-energy Top Hat production of “Nunsense” that opened Friday night at the Fairview Arts and Outreach Center seems like an odd choice for Brian Palumbo’s theater company.
After scaling the dizzying creative heights of such previous Top Hat spectaculars as “Ragtime” and “Aida,” “Nunsense” feels a bit like an artistic retrenchment. Or maybe Palumbo was just too tired after starring in the blockbuster Youngstown Playhouse mounting of “Chicago” earlier this season to tackle anything more ambitious.
But if the faithful who turned out en masse (no pun intended) for Friday’s opening night performance are any indication, nobody seems to have cared. Palumbo has wisely cast the show with some of the most reliable heavy-hitters on the community-theater circuit, and their industrial-strength comic performances provide much needed ballast for Groggin’s flimsy book and uninspired score.
The loosely plotted story line revolves around the efforts of the Little Sisters of Hoboken to raise money for the burial of four nuns who were accidentally poisoned by their cook (Sister Julia, Child of God).
They decide to stage a variety fundraiser, and that show-within-a-show framing device is the most sophisticated element of a musical-comedy that owes more to “Hee-Haw” than it does to (Stephen) Sondheim.
Each nun has a hook to go along with her habit. Mother Superior Mary Regina (Terri Wilkes) is an incurable hambone who can’t resist upstaging her charges; novice Sister Mary Leo (Brandy Johanntges) dreams of becoming a ballerina; Sister Robert Anne (Geri DeWitt) is a tough-talking Brooklynite; Sister Mary Hubert (Donna Huntley) is the sole African-American sister in the bunch; and Sister Mary Amnesia (Julie Palumbo) has been in a permanent fog since a crucifix fell on her head.
Like “Tony ’n’ Tina’s Wedding” (another critic-proof regional theater favorite), audience participation is a big part of the “Nunsense” experience.
The sisters mingle with the audience pre-show and during intermission, even conducting the occasional pop quiz.
Their good-natured schtick works like a charm every time, but would it be a sin to wish that “Nunsense” were a lot funnier and smarter than it is?
Fortunately, the actors maintain such an infectious level of enthusiasm that you might not even notice how tired — and occasionally desperate — their vaudevillian patter really is.
The adorable Julie Palumbo (who also assisted with the choreography) and indefatigable trouper DeWitt earn the evening’s biggest laughs; Johanntges proves why she’s one of the area’s most in-demand musical-theater performers; and Huntley (so memorable as Mama Morton in the YP “Chicago”) continues to impress with her comedic range and vocal prowess.
Top Hat’s “Nunsense” is as good as “Nunsense” gets. Whether that’s enough depends on your tolerance for religious humor.
“Nunsense” runs through next Sunday at the Fairview Arts and Outreach Center. For reservations, call 330-755-6573.